Here’s our latest interview with a millionaire as we seek to learn from those who have grown their wealth to high heights.
If you’d like to be considered for an interview, drop me a note and we can chat about specifics.
This interview took place in March.
It’s a long one (which I love!) so I’m breaking it into two separate posts. If you missed part one, you can catch up by reading Millionaire Interview 473.
My questions are in bold italics and their responses follow in black.
NET WORTH
What money mistakes have you made along the way that others can learn from?
If I had to do things over again, I would not have bought a house. We bought one with the expectation of having kids and a dog.
We found out early on that we could not have children. We got the dogs and found out that they would rather hang out near the house where the people (and food) were, rather than explore and play in the large yard.
We spent hundreds of thousands of dollars renovating the place (not to mention all the sweat equity I put in on my days off). We are still spending thousands of dollars a year on home maintenance.
The townhouse condo we were living in before we bought the single-family dwelling was more than adequate for our needs. In retrospect, we should have stayed there and bought another townhouse condo for rental income.
With a townhouse condo, there is little or no home maintenance that you have to do so your weekends are your own. I would rather be at the beach or hiking instead of mowing the lawn.
Yes, condo maintenance fees can be steep, but if your condo association is well run and honest, you usually end up better off.
If I had to do things over again, I would have gone on for graduate school as soon as possible after earning my BSN. I would have ended up making more money and having more opportunities.
Getting married right after college was great but the minutiae of married life take precedence over more schooling. I actually tried going back for premed but found it too difficult to attend classes after working nights in the ER to pay the mortgage so I had to quit. I’ve thought about going back now that everything is paid off, but when you do the cost/benefit analysis, it doesn’t make sense for me to do it at this point.
Don’t buy a lot of stuff that you think you might want/need. You will find out quite quickly that you’ve wasted your money.
I’ve got shelves full of books that I haven’t read. I have a tuxedo and a few nice suits that I have worn only a few times.
I have lots of nice cold weather gear and clothing that was purchased for a few ski trips when I was younger. Guess what? They’re gathering dust in the back of my closet right now.
Fortunately, I learned early on that you buy good stuff that will last so I can still wear the cold weather clothing I bought over 20 years ago – looks a little dated but it still fits and it still keeps me warm.
Don’t keep 3 cars unless you really need them. At one time, we had 3 cars – a pickup, a station wagon, and a sedan. I found out that 2 cars were more than enough and I saved a lot when I sold the third car – no more insurance, registration, safety checks, or maintenance.
We bought a whole bunch of kitchen stuff that we hardly ever use. It’s actually cheaper for us to eat out at this point in our lives.
You save on time spent shopping for food, prepping meals, and cleaning up after meals. When we do go out, we usually eat at cheap places like diners.
A diner meal will usually make two meals for us since we don’t eat a lot. Supplement the leftovers with a salad from home and you have tomorrow’s lunch.
Watch the gift giving. We used to go all out for Christmas. Not anymore.
We exchange stocking stuffers now because we really don’t need much at this point. We keep a strict budget for gift giving for family, friends, and work.
Really do your homework before buying stock. I’m pretty conservative when it comes to buying stock.
I go for the unglamorous companies that make important stuff/solid products we need (think pharmaceuticals, medical supplies/equipment, banks, tech/computers, etc.) and that pay decent dividends.
Having said that, I’ve bought a few dogs – Boeing being the biggest one. Overall, I have done quite well with my picks.
What advice do you have for ESI Money readers on how to become wealthy?
Learn all you can about how to manage your finances.
Work hard, be frugal, live within your means.
FUTURE
What are your plans for the future regarding lifestyle? Will your net worth allow you to retire early, downsize jobs, etc.?
I did get to retire early from working full-time. The per-diem job I currently do is basically for keeping me mentally active and socially engaged and I can quit it at any time.
We are planning on downsizing. We have no kids and the house is getting harder and more dangerous to maintain as I get older.
Plus, we have no kids so the extra space is being underutilized. My goal is to find a sufficiently large condo either here in Hawaii or on the mainland that has good security.
It’s got to have adequate space so both of us have our own private areas. This way, we can lock up and travel without having to go through the hassle of finding someone to watch the place.
What are your retirement plans?
Continuing to seek out efficient investments (increasing passive investment income).
Reducing financial fees – current CFP seems to be consistently pushing me into mutual funds when I have largely divested myself of all mutual funds years ago due to their management fees. I decided to bite the bullet and invest in a few and so far, they have been doing well so kudos to my CFP.
I want to do as much travel as I can before I can’t. A move to the mainland is a possibility – both for its lower cost of living and proximity to larger hub airports with more direct flights to other areas of the world.
Doing more cooking and working on my hobbies, home projects, possibly going back to school for another degree, etc.
Are there any issues in retirement that concern you? If so, how are you planning to address them?
Will I outlive my money? I still have my doubts about the feasibility of retirement in Hawaii. Even though our CFP and CPA say we can do it, we are still hedging our bets.
Health is becoming more of a concern. While I am in decent shape for a 64-year-old, I do feel the ravages of age creeping up – more joint aches, getting sicker more often (immune system changes), less endurance, etc.
I am hoping that medical science continues to make strides in the areas of gerontology and longevity. I don’t want to live forever.
I just want to be healthy and active for as long as possible so I can enjoy what life I have left. To this end, I really eat healthy and sparingly, and I try to stay physically and mentally active.
MISCELLANEOUS
How did you learn about finances and at what age did it “click”?
Watching my parents getting divorced while I was in high school and seeing how their poor financial management skills impacted their lives. My father retired as a senior vice-president for a big brokerage house (think Merrill Lynch) but was married and divorced 3 times in his life.
He had the chance to have a great retirement and against the advice of a financial planner, did not diversify his retirement portfolio which at the time was worth in excess of $1 million back in the late 1980s. He was heavily invested in the company he worked for and when it nearly went bankrupt back in the late 1990’s, he lost over half the value of his retirement portfolio.
My mother was very much into status – she pestered her friends to sponsor her into the Junior League, she furnished our house with Danish mid-century modern teak furniture, she had a significant jewelry collection including 2 Rolex watches, she nagged my father no end to buy one of the first Audis on the island of Oahu just so she could get it ahead of her friend who wanted the same model, etc.
She was a stay-at-home mom up until the 1970’s when she had to go to work (which she did not like at all) during all the economic upheaval of inflation, the energy crisis, and the stock market crash/recession.
When I got married at 27, it really came down to me realizing that if I wanted to get ahead and avoid the mistakes of my parents, I needed to work hard and get smart about my finances. I used up nearly all my savings to buy my wife’s wedding ring.
Fortunately, I had paid all my bills and rent prior to that and I was working full-time as a graduate RN fresh out of school so I had a good chance of future income coming in and I knew I would have enough to meet expenses with a little left over.
My wife was also working as a nurse but she was a little better off financially as she was still living at home with her parents (Even though she was paying a token amount in rent, her mom was still making her meals and her dad was still chauffeuring her into town to work.). I was living in a studio, owned very little, and paid my monthly rent and expenses out of my own pocket.
I worked two 8-hour shifts every Saturday and one 8-hour shift every Sunday as an LPN on a busy medical surgical unit every weekend while I was studying for my BS in nursing. My father helped me out with my college tuition for which I am very grateful, and I did receive some generous scholarships due to my good grades.
I took out only one small student loan which was paid off 5 years after I got married.
Who inspired you to excel in life? Who are your heroes?
My EMS instructors and nursing school professors all came from similar molds – none of them (with the exception of one who attended the same private school as I did – she was very nice and smart by the way and everyone loved having her for clinical rotations.) came from rich beginnings and all made their money the old-fashioned way – they earned it. (Apologies to John Houseman and Smith Barney)
I owe a debt of gratitude to my father who tried to keep the family together. He had a truly Sisyphean task of paying off lots of debt from his 3 divorces, paying private school and college tuition for 3 kids, and saving up for his own retirement.
I learned to work hard, do the best for my patients, and always give more than a 100%. Thanks to all of you who were such great role models – I am eternally grateful.
Do you have any favorite money books you like/recommend? If so, can you share with us your top three and why you like them?
Kiplinger’s and Money magazine – just about everything I learned regarding financial management and investing came from that excellent magazine.
The Millionaire Next Door – kind of made me realize that millionaires come in all shapes and sizes, and that showing off signs of conspicuous consumption is not the rule but the exception.
Series 7 and 66 exam prep books (Training Consultants and/or Trivium was what I used. There are probably other publishers).
Your local newspaper and periodicals like Time and Newsweek. Keeping ahead of trends and current events helps you make informed decisions when it comes to buying stocks and bonds.
Do you give to charity? Why or why not? If you do, what percent of time/money do you give?
We donate used clothing, household goods, and our old computer equipment to various local charities – perhaps about a couple thousand a year give or take. There are a few reasons: 1) it helps to reduce clutter 2) some of it can be written off on taxes 3) the stuff we donate is still good and reusable so less waste to go into a landfill 4) we sometimes shop at thrift shops – vintage clothing for parties, books, other useful stuff.
I would say that we give about 1% but that’s hard to quantify since much of what we donate is tangible.
My wife is a devout Christian who leans more towards the dogma of fundamental evangelical Christianity. Me? Not so much.
Early on in our marriage, we decided to tithe but stopped when we realized how much we were subsidizing our church. What helped that along was the news that our pastor decided to buy himself a Mercedes Benz.
After that and a few other things that led to the church imploding, my wife and I stopped going to church and we only donate money for true emergencies (example: the 2011 Tohoku earthquake/tsunami relief fund through the American Red Cross).
Do you plan to leave an inheritance for your heirs (how do you plan to distribute your wealth at your death)? What are your reasons behind this plan?
We have no children so anything we have left (and it will be a big chunk) will go into a scholarship for needy nursing students. We were both poor when we started out in nursing school, and both of us benefited from some generous benefactors who gave us scholarships and grants which in turn, helped us pay for tuition and books.
We have not forgotten that kindness so we will do the same for someone else.
Postscript:
I wrote all this in the interest of helping others achieve financial independence and to let others know that you can succeed by working hard, saving as much as possible, and investing wisely.
I started collecting Medicare last year and it has been an experience. Two years before you apply for Medicare, watch your income.
Try to stay under the threshold at which Medicare starts tacking on IRMAA (income-related monthly adjustment amount). 2023 was an outlier for me financially. I got busy in my per-diem job and ended up making way more than I had planned.
During that same year, I also did a hefty IRA to Roth conversion. All that boosted our income into a higher tax bracket and because of the 2-year look-back that Medicare uses to determine if you pay more or less for Part B and D, it meant I ended up paying more than $1000/year extra for Medicare coverage.
Drug coverage is different under Medicare. I use an Epi Pen and Medicare does not fully cover it so now I have to pay over $200 for it.
There is an approximately $2100 deductible I have to reach before Medicare pays for all my medications – I am at that sweet spot where I will never reach that deductible but will still end up paying the equivalent of a roundtrip plane ticket between the West Coast and Hawaii. Such is life. I am grateful that I have enough of a reserve that I complain about it but can still pay for it with minimal discomfort.
In spite of the current economic situation, my investments have done well. There is a little extra market volatility now and then but the fluctuations have been minor since I rejuggled my portfolio.
I am still on track to reach $2 million in 2 years (or less) unless something major happens.
Retirement has been great. We had a wonderful trip to London and Paris in October of 2025 – all of which I planned and put together myself thus saving thousands of dollars in the process.
I have really cut back at work having only worked a few days a month since last summer. There have been small withdrawals from my savings and brokerage accounts during that time to cover any joint account shortfalls but I had planned for that.
Despite the withdrawals, my net worth actually increased since last year. February was a killer month – I was doing extensive prep work for a class I was teaching, our homeowners insurance jumped over $1000 dollars so I had to find insurance through a different carrier, we were establishing relationships with new doctors and a new dentist since our old ones retired, our CPA went with new tax software which made tax prep much longer and more difficult for us.
So, life has been busy but I guess that’s not a bad thing overall.
One thing I cannot stress enough is the importance of early financial education. It was indoctrinated into us to take full advantage of our 401Ks – put as much as possible into them and go for the full company match.
Roths were an afterthought and it wasn’t until much later that I realized my retirement accounts were going to be taxed heavily because of this oversight. Today, the majority of my retirement is in my traditional IRA and a fraction of that is in my Roth.
IRA-Roth conversions are now a necessity and I wish that someone had told us back in 1998 to balance things out to avoid a larger tax bill later.
Another thing to be aware of is that by and large, the companies you work for do not always have your best interests in mind. This is why I carry my own malpractice insurance policy.
If you work for a company that does not allow you to use your sick leave unless you exhaust all your paid time off first, that is a red flag. I accumulated over 600 hours of sick leave and had to relinquish it all when I retired from the hospital. It rankles me to this day.
Learn about taxes and how they will affect your finances. When I first started itemizing, I did my own taxes.
Once we got married, we started seeing a CPA as things got more complex. I am more cognizant now than I ever was about federal and state tax brackets.
While I know that many fortunes were made in real estate, this is not a reality for us as real estate is very expensive in Hawaii. Yes, you can buy large tracts of vacant land on the Big Island cheaply, but if you don’t do something with it (farm it, build rental property on it, subdivide it, etc.), it will be just lying around doing nothing.
Unless you have something to harvest on your vacant land, it will become a negative drag on your income. Count on more overhead if you develop it because vacant land will require infrastructure like water, sewer, telephone, cable, power, etc.
Who’s going to watch your property when you aren’t there? You might need to hire security to prevent people from squatting on, growing marijuana on, or vandalizing your property.
But know the rudiments of land ownership, tenancy, property taxation, and if you decide to make the jump into owning a single-family dwelling, pick a good location in a good neighborhood near needed amenities.
On the bright side, my wife finally went part-time and now only works 3 days a week. She is much happier and I am enjoying spending more time with her now.
Despite our frugal lifestyles, we have traveled extensively and have had some great times, so work hard but also take some time out to enjoy the fruits of your labor.
ESI is the way to go – stay positive and enjoy life!
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