Glorious Way Church
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Income: Financial Fuel | Roadmap To Kingdom Wealth 3 | James & Claire Buntrock
In this episode, the hosts explore biblical principles of financial stewardship, debt management, and building sustainable wealth. They discuss practical strategies for tracking spending, creating income streams, and investing wisely—all while honoring God and using the resources He provides. From tithing and snowballing debt repayment to entrepreneurship and real estate, listeners will gain actionable tips for achieving financial freedom and creating generational wealth.
Claire and I got to uh um start this or kick this off with Pastor in the very beginning and and talked about some big picture things, some overview of kingdom finance and uh and God's plan for you. You know, it's uh uh it says in Proverbs 10 22 that the blessing of the Lord makes one rich and he adds no sorrow with it. And so uh there's a plan. There's a plan and a way for us to succeed and accomplish all that God has for us in his kingdom and to not run short while doing it. And so uh we'll just hit some overview of uh of what we started with. Um we started the series off with a video with Dr. Royal Roberts uh talking about he had received a very stern warning from God, and he was warning the people, warning the church, the uh the church in America that America is not ready for the second coming. And uh and the church is not ready for the second coming. And he talked about there being a wasting of power, and specifically, he talked about the church being in uh deep end debt and people, individuals in debt, and specifically credit card debt, that that high interest rate debt that's so easy to spend, so easy to get caught up in debt, and the way out is such a painful escape. And he talked about how people are not in a position to obey God when God calls us to do something. We have to say, Oh God, I'm sorry, I can't, you see, I've got to make the credit card payment this month. And so his very strong urging back then in 2005 was get out of debt right now. And here we are 20 years later in 2025, and the same holds true. Um and then on uh the next Wednesday, uh Jay and Selena got to minister on the leaks. And so let me just ask people in in the audience right now, have y'all taken time to do some kind of accounting to look at what you're spending to understand what the outgo is? Because it's hard to under it's hard to plug anybody, Jane. It's hard to plug the leaks.
SPEAKER_01:You don't have to raise your hand if you didn't.
SPEAKER_00:Well, I I think everybody's understanding we got to account for things.
SPEAKER_01:We do, and and and what and some other things we talked about, we we just in general, moving from the curse to the blessing, and how there's an ease that comes upon us when God when we are just in the blessing, and then we're under the spout where the glory pours out. And then just how putting God first uh opens the door for him to be able to perform all these other things that we need in this life. But we have to put him first, we have to obey him with the tithe. And then what is your why? And I think a lot of us just, you know, you can amass, we see the world worldly wealthy, and they just amass, amass, amass their wealth, but they have no grounding, they have no joy in their heart, they have no love, and uh, and so it's empty. So we understand that, hey, it's kingdom wealth, it's to build the kingdom. That's right. And uh, and so then uh Jane Selena went into purchasing uh like just rebuking the devourer, stopping the leaks, you know, we're gonna close the door on those things, we're gonna purchase insurance, all kinds of practical things that they had a lot of, and that even at down to specific apps you can use to manage and get a hold of your spending, and uh and just uh being faithful over your flocks and herds to know the know the state of thy flux. And uh, and so we've talked about those things, and um, and so we need to get right into, we have a lot of content tonight about the income side, about shifting gears now from talking about loss and the devour, and now, hey, what is our engine that makes us go down that road of kingdom wealth? And um, and so Yeah, that's right.
SPEAKER_00:And so, you know, the the answer if you're trying to fill a bathtub with water and you have leaks in that bathtub and water's coming out and water's going in, the answer is not more water. At least not in that moment. And so once you've plugged the leaks, we're talking about tonight, after you've stopped the leaks, now you can open the spigots up and fill that tub. And so let's get ready to open. Yep, let's get our bathtub full. Um I'm gonna I'm gonna start. You take my notes for just a second. I'm gonna walk off camera and I'm gonna pull the whiteboard out. And uh, I've got some things loaded on here. But can you imagine? Y'all see that monopoly board right there in the middle? And so Lee is gonna jump up and adjust that camera because he can't see the monopoly board on there. But there is a monopoly board on here. But can y'all imagine uh playing a game of Monopoly where all you did is roll the dice and work around the board, and you never bought an income-producing property, and your best hope was to make it around the board and stay out of jail and hope to get around one more time where you could collect that$200. How would that be for a uh for a plane?
SPEAKER_01:That was a long, slow game to lose like that, and I I can remember crying over stuff like that. That when you never land on a property to buy it, and then everybody else buy-oh.
SPEAKER_00:Yep. Yes. So that whole the entirety of that game is built on building your income streams. And uh and that's a that's a success lesson for life. Um but before you build a whole bunch of streams, you have to start with one stream. And so the very first thing on our list is having an active income. Uh Proverbs 14, 23 says, In all labor there is profit, but idle chatter leads to poverty. And so at the start.
SPEAKER_01:Stop talking and start doing.
SPEAKER_00:That's it. Get to work. Get to work. Uh Proverbs 10 uh 4 through 5. He who has a slack hand becomes poor, but the hand of the diligent makes rich. And he who gathers in summer is a wise son, and he who sleeps in harvest is a son who causes shame.
SPEAKER_01:Who sleeps when? What time is it now? I I think it's harvest time. Have y'all checked the calendar? Everybody say it's harvest time. So we're not asleep. It's time, it's a year of milestones, and we are believing we're doing the natural side tonight, but there is a supernatural element that God will do when we do our part.
SPEAKER_00:So you got different types of active income, and this is gonna be what we're minoring on tonight. Uh, but but being a good employee, having a job, just working for someone, and earning uh an honest wage is number one. Uh beyond that, there's there's entrepreneurship where you're you're adding value to something, you're creating something that there's a demand for, you're providing a service, you're you're you're finding your niche in a marketplace and becoming a producer and a provider and a supplier uh and selling that. Um and then there's all sorts of uh uh other industries, cottage industries, um, things we can do online uh to create value and sell things. Um you want to talk about women in the marketplace?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, so well well, first of all, just back to cottage industries. Raise your hand if you have uh, I don't know, made made a craft and sold it at a little craft fair, or if you have had some kind of side economy, some kind of side gig like how many people made homemade soap and sold it? But that's what we're talking about, cottage industry, just something that came out of your garage that you worked out of your house house. Um but uh but I did want to start just um uh hitting on first of all um I will talk about women in the marketplace, but uh hear hear through this filter everything that we say and and know that uh and and I'm looking at a bunch of tithers and givers with a with a good heart to serve and love the Lord, uh, but let me just tell you that the overarching all of this is is the principle that a good name is rather to be chosen than great riches. So if it ever comes down to you've got to sell out what you really believe, just to make a book, you are forced to, you will lose your job if you don't compromise your values. You will, somebody has an ax over you and they are forcing you by you know they're gonna take away your income. Do let me just encourage you, do not sell out. It pays to keep your your heart right that comes from putting God first. If you put him first, he will always find a way to bless you. It might not happen uh in the order that you want. It you might have to go through a season, but never, never sell out. Um, and I have a story, uh, Bryson Renee Treywick could not be here tonight, but um, he recently told me, so he's worked for an engineering firm for almost 25 years. He was one month short of his 25 year. Uh and then, but the the the company cut him. They just let him go. Because at 25 years, he was gonna hit a new echelon and they were gonna have to pay him more new benefits, right, Micah? All of that. And so, oh, they just kind of never mind. And uh, but and so I'm sure that it was he was very tempted to feel very discouraged. And uh he stuck by stuck by his faith, and he uh it just turned out that the company, oops, they could not really live without his skill. Turns out he was not very replaceable. Turns out in order to make any kind of profit, they had to hire him back, and he may not have gotten those same benefits, but they had to pay him twice what they were paying him before, an hourly wage. And by the time the contract is all done, he's gonna have made more than he would have if he would have gotten into that industry. That's just the favor of God. And that's just the favor of God. So um I just want to encourage everybody, when it looks dark, just stick to your faith. Um, know that he and so now I I feel like I can get into um uh you know, I'm looking at a lot of women out here, and um men, you can so I just want to talk about roles in the home real quick. Um obviously, women, if you are single, then you can be amassing all of this for your future, and and God is he is your maker is your husband, and he is covering you, protecting you. Um but if you are a woman who is married, then uh sometimes there's a dichotomy. I want to speak to women in the marketplace, uh, because if we're married and we have uh we're now we're someone's help me. And we are supposed to help, that's our primary role in our life is to be a helper of our husband. And we can secondarily have a job in the marketplace outside the home or inside the home. We can do something to make, but our orientation of our life and our attitude is always to help our husband do the vision for the family that you have to together decided on. You're gonna he's gonna be that, and he's primarily oriented, not that he can't help at home, but he's primarily oriented toward the marketplace, um, primarily. And so it's our you know, as a as a woman, we we we both we you know, we submit to each other, but we are we're helping him in that way. And uh, and so I just but but even so, if you look at Proverbs 31, that woman is a busy woman bringing in some cash for her family. It is pretty awesome to see, and I just want to uh quickly, uh she is far worth far more than rubies. Uh he will have no lack of game. Uh she does them good and not evil. She seeks wool and flax and willingly works with her hands. She is like the merchant chips who brings her food from afar. I mean, my food comes from Costco and Tombaugh, but um uh anyway, she arises when it's yet night, she provides food for her household portion for her maidservant, so she sees she's caring for her household first. And then she uh then she considers the field and buys it. So she's into some real estate. She's got she knows some stuff. And from the profits of that, she's planting a vineyard. She's uh she's she perceives that her merchandise is good. She stretches out her hand to the distant. In other words, she's making some stuff at home and she might and she's a she's giving to the poor. Um, she's selling, she she looks great, she's taking care of herself, she's wearing the best, making the best, and then she sells some of the clothes that she wears. So she's got a lot going on here. And uh, and so, women, I don't want you to feel uh, you don't feel bad about your prosperity. Um, and and we can all participate in in this economy, amen.
SPEAKER_00:Let's contrast that a little bit with what our economy has turned into. This nation, we used to be uh uh a nation where one family could be supported by a single income, and typically the man would go out into the world and go to work, and the wife would stay home with the kids and be the nurturer of the family, and she took care of the home, and she could have a side gig and she could do some things besides that, but she didn't leave her family to go have a career outside in the world, and now we're in a place where just to have a family anymore, it really takes two incomes uh just to make it, and that ought not be so.
SPEAKER_01:It ought not be so, but at the same time, we I I believe if we put these pr principles to work, then we can we can let God bless us out of that condition. And we can have a desire to do that.
SPEAKER_00:If that's your desire to be a single-income family and to have a a mom and a wife that stay at home and look after the kids, kids, and maybe she does some things at home, but she's not building her career outside of the family, independent of the family. If you have that desire, I want you to know that that's that's a godly desire. That's something that God has a plan for, and if you want to walk that out, you can have that. And you'll see you'll start to see a way forward after tonight. Some ideas are gonna percolate. Remember that uh through tithing and and and giving offering and honoring God first, he doesn't rain down money and cars and houses and things out of heaven. He's gonna rain down the ideas, concepts, and insights. And when you put those things to work in your life, one idea from heaven will change your life and turn things around from you. So let's get on with the major part of the content tonight. Uh when we were up here, I talked about a plan that was a failing plan, and I think I I got it up here on the board. Uh, we talked about the the median savings for the Americans by the time you're you know retirement age is about$200,000. And uh and the average cost of living for a single person is about$55,000. If you're uh a married couple, it's roughly$80,000. Um and then if you add Social Security into that, uh you'll get a little bit more income. But the whole the whole design of the system that we're in now, many, many people are in now, is to go to school, make good grades so you can get into a good college, so you can uh get a degree, work for a good company so that you can uh work for about 40 years, and maybe they got a 401k match and you put money into that, and it's great if the company puts money into that too, but it's effectively a big pot of money that when you it's it is structured so that you have low taxes on it when you have little or no income at the end. And so when you're trying to retire, you're actually aiming at having little or no income so that you don't have a big tax hit when you take money out of your 401k or your IRA. And so to aim at having little or no income and hope that you have enough money left in this pot, I'm gonna stop working, I'm gonna end my career, and I've got this pot of money, and let's see how far$200,000 is gonna take me on the living expenses for me and my family, plus a little bit of Social Security. You're looking at maybe six, seven, possibly eight years of funding left for your life, and so you're really just kind of saying, Well, I I hope the money doesn't run out. I hope I die before the money runs out. And that's kind of where that plan takes you. And that's not a good plan.
SPEAKER_01:That's not in the Bible.
SPEAKER_00:That is not in the Bible.
SPEAKER_01:No, what I read is uh he he shall st he'll be fat and flourishing and still bear fruit in old age. In old age. He'll still bear fruit in old age. If we trust in the Lord and and we put him first, he will still bear fruit.
SPEAKER_00:That doesn't mean that you have to be grinding out a living in old age. It means that you have built something that bears fruit in old age, and you can still have a plenteous income in old age. Amen. Let's talk about the parable of talents, Matthew 25. Um, Jesus likened the kingdom of heaven to a man who traveled to a far country. He he called his servants in, and he delivered his goods to them. And it said he gave, you know, to the one five talents, to another two talents, and to another one talent.
SPEAKER_01:I want to point out in verse 15 it says, each according to his own ability.
SPEAKER_00:His own ability.
SPEAKER_01:His own ability. And so everybody got something. Everybody got, and a talent was a huge, you know, it was like, I think I calculated one time it was like a hundred thousand dollars or something. Um so God gave seed money to people, but the talent represents really anything that God gives you. He everybody has something that God gave them. Ability, uh, you know, good genes. I don't know. Whatever you have that God gave you, um, it can be money, but he gave you opportunity. He always gives us opportunities. And he doesn't want us to waste those things. He wants us to be faithful over them.
SPEAKER_00:God didn't shortchange anybody.
SPEAKER_01:That's right.
SPEAKER_00:He didn't shortchange anybody. Everybody has something, has some ability, some gift, some talent, something bestowed on them by God, some plan for their life to be successful. And so don't feel like I'm not good at anything, I can't do this stuff. That's a lie from the devil.
SPEAKER_01:Raise your hand if you know somebody with a really rough story, but God used it to put a fire in their belly, and now they're very successful. Uh, we all know people like that.
SPEAKER_00:Yep. So getting back to the parable of talents, one got five, another two, and another one, each according to his own ability. And uh the expectation was that they would be producers while their master is out. When the master returned, he checked up on him. And so the one with the five talents came back and said, Master, look, I I uh I took the five and I turned it into another five. So I've got ten now. He doubled it.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:And uh it said he gained by trading. Each one of these gained by trading, and so the master's response was, Well done, good and faithful. Again with the with the two, somebody had two talents, gained by trading, produced another two talents. Well done, good and faithful. And then what happened to the one who who had the one talent? It said he was afraid of his master, that he would lose if he lost it, he would be disappointing to his master. Well, of course, if you lost it, that's disappointing. But he buried it. He didn't lose it, he protected it, he buried it. He said, Look, I still got the one thing you gave me. And the master called him wicked and lazy.
SPEAKER_01:So he was lazy and he was fearful. Yep. So those are two things we have to overcome. It's in everyone's nature. Everyone would rather just have the status quo because that is comfortable for us. Everybody would rather, you know, our flesh would rather just keep things the way they are and not take a risk and uh and sit on the couch and you know how many of you canceled your Netflix recently, I did. Um so anyway, but you know, we'd rather do something else, but um but but there is an excitement about trading in the marketplace.
SPEAKER_00:So the the the the master said here, you should have at least deposited my money into the bank where I could have at least collected interest. So at a bare minimum, at the bare minimum, don't put it under your mattress. Don't put it under the mattress, don't bury it in the hole. Um, do something that produces interest. This is where your money works for you. And so I've got a handout that y'all should have picked up on the way in here. It's a lot of pages, it has a lot of information. I am not going to cover everything that's in here. Come on.
SPEAKER_01:Can we calculate compound and interest?
SPEAKER_00:That is calculated in here. You can look at this stuff right in here. So the very first thing on this list, and we need to be tithers, we need to be sowers of seed. That puts you into position to be producers uh under God's plan, under his blessing. And and and I know we're fond of saving, saying that uh your savings will never outperform your giving. And that is true. Your sowing, your giving produces. It's it's seed that goes in. But on the practical side tonight, uh we need to have an emergency fund built up so that when life happens, you don't have to cut everything back and stop and take your kids out and and stop eating food and and just go down to the bare minimum here. And so save, save, save. Whatever income you have on your active income side, you need to be taking a piece of that. Decide between a what husband and a wife, decide how much you can afford to take out of that. And I encourage you to not deposit a check in the bank and then withdraw some money out and then deposit it into a savings account. Do set up something so that you don't even feel it, you don't know it. If you have direct deposit, simply direct some into your operating or checking account and direct some more into another amount into a savings account that bears interest.
SPEAKER_01:So just to sum up, so if your priorities are, number one, be a tither because you don't want to rob God and be under a curse. So get out from under the curse, tithe. I can't afford to tithe. You cannot afford not to tithe. James told that story. It's true. I it's you cannot afford not to. But once you are a tither, um then you're starting to build up your emergency fund.
SPEAKER_00:Yep, build up that uh Jay and Selena talked about attacking the debts, the snowball. Do all of that. Have an emergency fund, build up that emergency fund. And you do that by saving, and don't just save it in the hole or under your mattress, produce some in some interest with that. And so for your benefit on here, I've got some simple interest calculation, simple interest calculation and a compound interest calculation so you can see the difference. A compound interest is simply this. If you do simple interest, it's the principal times the rate times the time. And you'll end up, so if you put$1,000 away and you earn 5% interest in that in that account, uh, and if it's earned over the course of one year,$1,000 produced$50 in 12 months. That's simple interest. If that interest is compounded monthly, the 5% will be divided by the number of months in a year, and then that interest will be calculated every month and deposited into that account every month, and then the next month you're earning interest on what you started with plus the interest that you earned. And the next month you've got two months of interest earned that you're earning interest on, and so it starts to compound and grow at a little bit faster pace. And so you can look at those calculations and understand that. Um so the frequency uh of the compounding matters. Um there are other investment mechanisms uh listed in here that bear interest. Um, and some of these bear simple interest, and you can look at uh various types of bonds like uh the the US uh EE, the double E savings bonds, uh the US series bonds. Um there's options with with those. Uh also uh CDs. How many familiar with CDs, certificates of deposit? And so this is kind of like a savings account in a bank that earns a particular amount of interest. Um and there's some benefits to that because it's producing interest. Um if you it there's a couple of different types there. There's something called a brokered CD that tends to earn a compounded interest and has the flexibility to withdraw it or to or to sell those CDs quickly if you need to. So when you're putting money away in a savings account, it's very liquid. You can make a withdrawal when you need it.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, this is all like when we're talking about this, we're talking about for your emergency fund. Put it in something like this that he's talking about, where it's at least gaining a little bit of interest, it it probably won't outpace inflation. So this is not your long-term retirement plan, this is not your long-term savings plan, but gets you three to six months worth of expenses in this account.
SPEAKER_00:If you have a savings account that earns a simple interest, that's good. If you were to take some money and buy uh a CD that would earn a little bit higher interest rate, that's even better. But there's a penalty if you withdraw that money out early, and so you you can lose on that one. And so you can get a three-month CD, a six-month, a nine-month, a twelve-month, a five-year, uh, you can get CDs for various lengths of time. But if you tie your money up for a whole year and that's your emergency fund and you need it, now you're in a bind when it goes to get it. So my recommendation is if you're gonna put money into CDs, is to stagger these things. You might get one for three months, and another for six months, and another for nine months. You can stagger the maturity date of these CDs so that every few months you have another one maturing, and that money becomes accessible to you again in case you need it. And so you can build all that in addition to uh the savings account, but at least you're earning interest. At least you're getting something out of it.
SPEAKER_01:Um can I when can I talk about it? Okay. Um, so back to the parable of the talents. Um, that is my favorite thing to say. Look, God is a capitalist. Yep. He wants us to gain by trading. But um, obviously, our system is not a perfect system that we live under right now. We do not live under pure capitalism here. And uh if you would like to read about that subject and how to uh understand the system that we live in, I would highly recommend on Audible right now, you can download um Thomas Sowell's book, Basic Economics. Thomas Sowell, brilliant economist and thinker, and just kind of lets you know how th how the world works. Um but we do not live in a perfect capitalism system, not that it wouldn't be perfect. A perfect capitalist system would be among people who all love the Lord and have high morals and standards and love their neighbor as themselves, and we bring our talent into the marketplace and we serve each other, and the the need that we meet in the market is uh is paid back to us with that money that we earn. And the more we can get uh if our skill or our good or service is rare and also in in high demand, then we will get a bigger, we will get a bigger amount of money for our good or service. But if if anybody can do it, and everybody's willing to do it, and everybody wants to do it, then our skill won't be worth as much in the marketplace. Let me give you an example. Porta-potties. The port-a potty business is very lucrative because not very many people are willing to go out and pick up the boxes and clean them and empty them. People don't like doing that. So I hear that there's a lot of money to be made in that because people aren't willing to do it. Then there are businesses that they're there people are not able to do it. Not everyone can be a rocket scientist. That takes a high level of training and education and intelligence. Not everybody is suited to that, and so that is a rare skill that commands a high price in the marketplace. So um um, but uh but we have what our system is broken because we do have corruption, we do have uh dishonesty in the in the competition, we don't have true competitive marketplace. If we did, it would be awesome. People would be prosperous like crazy. We also have government regulations, which sometimes they're needed, but many times they are just putting a cap on what what we can produce, then there are government subsidies that are encouraging things that are not productive, and we shouldn't be doing that. And so if you want to learn about all of that in policy and kind of how it relates to your life, again, Thomas Sowell. Awesome. Um, but uh fill if so if you can in the marketplace, if it still holds true, even with corruption, even with interference, even with whatever else, if you feel a need in the marketplace, if you find something that nobody else can do or is willing to do, and you can do that for a little bit less money and than anyone than the next guy, then you will make a profit. Um so be thinking about that thing, that thing that you paid way too much for, but you just you had to bite your tongue and do it anyway because you just couldn't live without that thing. You couldn't live without that service or that good. And what is that thing? And uh be willing to share that because that'll be a fun conversation afterwards.
SPEAKER_00:Instill this stuff into your kids as they're growing, give them opportunities to earn money, give them entrepreneurial opportunities for them to make money.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, let them learn a skill.
SPEAKER_00:Have them set a goal out front. Uh when I was a kid, I I was 16, and and I recognized there's no way my parents are gonna be able to buy me a car. That's not gonna happen. We didn't have money. And so if it was gonna happen, I Had to do it. And so I used our lawn equipment to start mowing yards in the neighborhood. And then my dad drove me to some yards because my business kind of grew a little bit further. And then when I had my license, then I could drive myself to the I saved up money for my very first car. Um I had a goal and I met the goal and built the business.
SPEAKER_01:I know somebody else who did that. So you know, get-raise your hand if you bought your own your first car by yourself. Yeah? Yes. Awesome. All right. My parents bought mine.
SPEAKER_00:So what you hear tonight, let's put this, let's put this into practice. If you if you if you're setting a goal and you want to know how long it takes to make a particular amount of money, there's a simple rule in this packet called the the rule of 72. Uh the example is uh if your investment has an 8% return, so this could be interest, but it could be any any type of investment. If it produces a a relatively steady rate of return in in the form of a percentage here, uh if it produces eight percent, uh it's gonna take approximately nine years to double, and you can see the calculation in there. And so if you're setting a goal.
SPEAKER_01:So it took nine years.
SPEAKER_00:Well, if they earned eight percent. But I bet they did better than that.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, hopefully they did.
SPEAKER_00:And there are investments that'll do a whole lot better than that. Um and we've got a a chart broken out in here where you can see uh that time growth of money uh on the interest rate. Um let's talk about stocks uh for a minute, since we're talking about gaining by trading and God being a capitalist here. Uh in taking your money and investing it in someone else's business. I mean, effectively we're talking about stocks here, but that could be any type of business that you're investing in that's going to produce something, a return for you. Uh stocks can produce uh dividend returns. Uh so that's that's like having an income come back. Uh those can be reinvested into the stock or into the investment. Um, they can also grow in equity. So you buy at one level and then you sell at another level, and there's a gain. Uh there's tax implications all the way through here.
SPEAKER_01:Um or you can buy the thing that everybody wants and then it drops the next day, and you can live and you lose money that way.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Uh buy low and sell high.
SPEAKER_01:Buy low. Buy low, sell high. Buy the thing that nobody thinks they want right now.
SPEAKER_00:Um I'm not an expert in stocks. We've owned stocks. Um we've we've made money in stocks, and we've lost money in stocks. And uh I'm I'm not an expert in that. I don't recommend stocks, but people can do well with stocks.
SPEAKER_01:Um hire an expert if you're not investing in the market.
SPEAKER_00:Hire an expert. If you're gonna invest in in the stock market, invest in some type of funds to start, something that's got your your investment spread across the board in multiple industries, multiple uh markets, multiple products or businesses. Do something that that that'll provide a little bit of a safety net. If one's losing a little bit here, the others can be gaining there. But even still that, and that's called diversifying your investments. Um but diversifying something such that when this one wins, this one's losing, and vice versa, that's really not a great ratio.
SPEAKER_01:Um because you're always losing and diversify.
SPEAKER_00:Yes.
SPEAKER_01:You don't want to do that.
SPEAKER_00:No.
SPEAKER_01:Um we'll we'll talk about that in a minute. What um go ahead.
SPEAKER_00:Let's just take the example of uh the S P 500. So the S the Standard and Poor's 500 market, uh since 1957, it has delivered an annual rate of return uh of about 10.54 percent, but when adjusted for inflation, the real rate is about is almost 7%. So how many know we're in a state of kind of hyperinflation right now? Um if you want to defend against inflation, I was always told that you you buy gold to uh protect your in uh yourself against inflation. Um I don't think gold is a very good investment.
SPEAKER_01:Did you bring your shiny coin?
SPEAKER_00:I did not bring my shiny gold coin, but I've got a one-ounce gold coin.
SPEAKER_01:Um, pull this coin out, and I didn't bring it tonight.
SPEAKER_00:Um I think I bought that coin back in maybe 20 2013. It was roughly maybe$1,200 an ounce, and so I I bought a gold coin. Today it's worth$4,100. And you think, wow, that's awesome. Wow. But really, that's a a a reflection of how poorly the US dollar is doing. The dollar has fallen, gold didn't really change, or the demand didn't change that much for it.
SPEAKER_01:It still buys pretty much the same thing that it would have been.
SPEAKER_00:It's roughly the same thing at that time, it just means things have cost more. So calculating inflation in here, the S P 500 uh on the average will do 6.68% return on your investment. And so I've in your uh in your uh uh handout right here, I've got uh an example that if you started with$5,000 and plugged in and added weekly to it. So if if you've got$100 from your paycheck every week going into investing into a fund within this within the S P$500 market, and you did that for 10 years, you would take$5,000 plus your$100 a week, accounting for inflation and and and how that that SP$500 typically does, you would end up with about$82,000 in ten years. And you didn't really feel it because it was a hundred dollars a week and you got used to living without that. And it turned into eighty-two thousand. If you kept doing that for twenty years, you'd end up with two hundred and thirty-one thousand dollars. It more than doubled in in in that period of time.$231,000 in 30 years,$514,000. If you did it for 40 years, it'd be over a million dollars. Starting with$5,000 and adding$100 a week into something that produced an interest rate return.
SPEAKER_01:So I'm a millionaire in 40 years. If I start with I'm 20 and I do that till I'm 60, I'm a millionaire, not having any other. I mean, I could be a truck driver, I could be a ditch digger, I could be whatever, and I but I I just managed to save enough money and invest it, I could still be a millionaire when I'm 60 if I start when I'm 20. But what the world system does is when you're 20, they say get a credit card and get everything that you want right now. And now the entire model is working in reverse. And instead of a millionaire at 60, you're gonna owe a million dollars at 60.
SPEAKER_00:It's the same rate of return for the interest for the for the credit card company. That's how they're making it. That rate of return works for them because it's putting you in debt.
SPEAKER_01:So that so we can say, get out of debt, get out of debt, and wrap you with the ruler, but it it's not it it's just because it's so damaging. It's just because it it takes away your wealth building and um potential, especially if you're young.
SPEAKER_00:And if you follow the stock market, if you watch these investments and you think, okay, well things are going up, they're gaining in value, and you're getting excited, wow, look at look at how this stock has increased, increased, increased, and then you decide to buy because you're watching it go up and you have this fear of missing out. I don't want to miss out. It's it's still going up, it's probably got some more room, and then you buy, and then it starts to drop. Everybody gets excited and everybody piles in and buys, but then that and then the the value goes down and then you get scared.
SPEAKER_01:You know what I see?
SPEAKER_00:And then you sell.
SPEAKER_01:I don't see that in the Bible.
SPEAKER_00:No.
SPEAKER_01:I see that Isaac went to Gerar during a famine and he sowed in that year in the time of famine and he reaped a hundredfold.
SPEAKER_00:He was contrary to the market.
SPEAKER_01:He was a contrarian. Genesis 26, 12. Uh Isaac sowed in that land, that land that everybody else was uh he could have he could have eaten that seed, he could have sold the seed that he put in the ground. People were hungry. They would have loved to have eaten that seed right then. But and so it was worth a lot of money that he but he sowed it in faith, believing. And so in in a time of famine, and uh and so I see that in the Bible. I see that Abraham, Abram, was very rich in cattle, silver, and gold. One version says, in all commodities. He was rich. Um, so he was diversified, not diversified. The reason we say diversified is because you can get into all these complicated investments that you do not understand. Because someone told you you should diversify. And so, ooh, I'm in the stock market, I'm in real estate over here. Oh, we're gonna talk about some other in income. We're in this and we're in that and we're in that. We bought a timeshare. I'm so sorry, please don't do that. Um anyway, uh, you know, you you're you're diversified because you don't understand the thing that's working. So find, get real smart about or find an expert to help you learn. And James always says experts are expensive.
SPEAKER_00:Amateurs are real expensive.
SPEAKER_01:Amateurs, real expensive. Find an expert. Find an expert or and find a way to learn yourself. And do not be intimidated. I'm telling you, y'all, audible.com. Get some books. Start. Um, the Bible is great. Read your Bible every day. Start there because that puts God first. But after that, you do not have to play phone games when you're in line. You can instead you can have a book going all the time in the background, an audio. Oh, I don't like to read. You're not reading, you're just listening to the book. Somebody reads it for you. Um, how do you think? I read Thomas Sowell's Basic Economics, and I listened to him narrate it. And it was, it was, it changed my whole perspective. It was awesome. But uh, but then find a book on wealth building. Um, you know, start thinking, oh, you know, um my my skill. I don't, I'm not good at managing people. I could never own a business. I could never I could never hire uh, you know what? You don't you don't know what you can do. Why don't you find a book on that? The guy down the street, he didn't know anything either. He just started reading and finding someone to mentor him and going to trade shows and going to conventions about that thing, whatever it is, meeting people, networking. Let God give you a plan, like something. Uh I just read another book. Um Never Eat Alone. It was about if you don't know how to network, now I don't agree with that guy's politics that wrote that book. Um, but uh but how to network, how to make conversation with anybody and how to make it count, um that is a great book. It will change your life just to learn how, hey, I'm gonna let the Lord give me a plan. And then when people ask you, oh, Derek, how are you doing? Instead of just saying, Oh, I'm fine, I'm good, you know, the weather, you can say, you know, I'm I'm great. Uh I'm hoping to get into this new venture over here. I do you know anybody who does that? Or do you know anybody in that country?
SPEAKER_00:You surround yourself with people that are good at this stuff, at the things that you want to do.
SPEAKER_01:They will want to connect you with resources.
SPEAKER_00:I want to help you with something that really helped us. When we uh bought our first home, we had a sudden urgency after we had been there a few years. We got to sell this home and get out of it. I thought we were gonna sell it, but it turns out we we made a rental property out of it. And we had never done that. We didn't go to a class, we didn't read a book, we didn't get any education on it. We talked to a realtor who kind of helped us through some of this stuff and thought it was a great idea, but we put that first home up as a rental property. It was a blessing to us, it was also a blessing to the kingdom of God because the renter was somebody who was in the neighborhood who was already renting a home in the neighborhood, and his landlord didn't pay the mortgage, and so the home got foreclosed on, and the renter had to leave the home because he had a bad landlord.
SPEAKER_01:And the renter happened to be a pastor who had been praying that God would open a door for them to not have to move out of that lovely neighborhood that they thought was they love the neighborhood, and their child was at school and rode the bus in that neighborhood. They didn't want to move, and God opened a door.
SPEAKER_00:It was our house. We moved out and and into a house that we bought, and they moved right in, and they were the best tenants that we ever had. And we had them for five or six years during that time. We've made all kinds of mistakes and done things not so well, and we still made money on that. It was a blessing to them and a blessing to us.
SPEAKER_01:We bought another home and our our tenant.
SPEAKER_00:Let me walk through the models, models of this because we're short on time and we've got to get to our groups.
SPEAKER_01:Okay, our tenant burned the kitchen down.
SPEAKER_00:So we got a new kitchen for insurance holiday. We had a rent, we've had several rental properties, had a kitchen fire. You know what? It was a great deal. You know why? We had insurance. And the renter required we required them to have insurance. We never lost rent through the entire period. We got a new kitchen, we got new paint, we got new flooring, we got new air conditioning system. We got new, new, new. By the time the house was done, it was in great shape. And we got to rent it out some more, and then when we sold it, we had a great piece of property that appreciated in value. Let me walk through some things on real estate. Real estate, I believe, is something that's gonna fund the harvest.
SPEAKER_01:It funded the early church. It funded the early church.
SPEAKER_00:Acts chapter 4. Read that. You'll see how they they sold houses, they brought their possessions, they funded the gospel of that time, and I believe it it'll still do that today. So let me walk through uh, and we're talking about passive income here. So you have a job and you're going to work and you're earning an income. These are things that produce an income while you sleep, while you're working, while you're playing, while you're going on vacation. It doesn't matter. They produce.
SPEAKER_01:You can qualify for these once you're out of debt. Once you're out of debt, now you're still snowballing, but now you're put you're throwing it into some kind of passive income stream.
SPEAKER_00:So investment. I have not thoroughly investigated the home that's in this packet right here. I just simply got on har.com and found a home that seemed like it was in the range of possibility to work with this model. But in this model, you've got to be in position to be able to put 20% down on a property, on a home. You have to find a home that's gonna be in a good area. You've got to find a home that where where there's a demand for it. So a typical home in the rental market is a three-bedroom, uh, two-bath home with a two-car garage. If you find that somewhere between 1,700, 1,800 square feet, maybe 2,200 square feet. If you go too big or too nice, it's not a good rental property. So about the 2,000 square foot mark is the prime spot for homes. I understand that real estate has gone up, up, up in value and price, and it's it's a tighter market to do things in, but people buy and sell, they make market money on the upside, on the downside, and all the way through the middle. Real estate is a great tool and it has been a blessing to us. We took our first home and we turned it into other rental properties. And since then we've turned it into uh investments in uh apartment complexes that produce at a much higher level than the single-family homes. But this single family model right here, um, this is a$230,000 home in the spring area. Uh three-bed, two-bath. Uh looks like it's uh about 2,500 square feet, so it's at kind of at the upper end of that size home. Uh it requires, so let's say it's it's listed for$230,000 and you do some inspections on this home. Maybe it's been on the market a long time and and they're really kind of in a distressed condition. They need to sell the home, they're willing to come down a little bit. You need to find a home at a good price. And so maybe you get the home for$220,000 in this model.
SPEAKER_01:Or you know a realtor who knows of the home before it goes on the market.
SPEAKER_00:If you have a realtor and you tell a realtor, I'm looking for deals, and this is the parameter that I'm looking for, they will bring you deals before they hit the market. They'll have a deal in their pocket and they'll know when they find the right thing for you, and they'll bring it to you, and you can move on it right away if it's the right thing. So putting 20% down, that's$44,000 out of pocket. Maybe you've got to put a little paint into it, a little repair, something minor in there. Uh, I've got the the costs of the deal broken out in here. So a total out of pocket, if you saved money, if you have money to invest, you've got your emergency fund, you've got money that you can invest now. If you've got about$56,000 you can invest in this home, you could buy this home uh and immediately put it into a rental market, because I see that this one has been recently uh renovated on the inside, so it sounds like it might be pretty clean if you check it out and it turns out to be a good deal. You buy this home, you put it in the rental market, uh, and then you you get an appraised value on it. The appraised value is$240,000 for market value on that home. So if you sold, if you bought it for$220,000 and it's really worth$240,000, you've immediately captured equity in this property. So with all the costs that goes into this, if I bought this home, uh I would immediately capture almost$14,000 of equity right off the top. Now I didn't get paid on that, it's just a bank account with a roof on top, and it's its value is a lot higher. During the course of time that I own this property, it will appreciate in value. When I go to sell this property, it's going to be worth maybe$40,000,$50,000 more than when I bought it. And so there's a gain to be had there. The cash flow on this property uh with the market rents in that area, uh, this will produce about$7,000 a year cash flow. How many could use an extra seven grand a year for doing nothing? Your money went to work for you. You put money into something and it just showed up in your mailbox on time every month, an extra seven grand a year. This is real right here. So your your your your rate of capital gain on this was about$14,000. You already earned 25% on your investment,$56,000 earned$25% up front. And then it produced an income for the next two, three, four, five years that you keep it rented of about six, seven thousand dollars a year. Your cash on cash return is almost thirteen percent. You're already outperforming your savings account, your CDs, your S P 500. You're outperforming on all of these fronts. Let's look at the types of And someone else is paying your mortgage every month. So let me let me walk me walk through those. You've got different types of gains to be had on this. You've got equity capture, number one. Your home appreciates in value, number two. You have a monthly income that you're not working for, it just comes in. Monthly income, number three. Did you know that you do not pay income tax on the income that you make on a rental property? There is no in people can pay income tax on it. I just don't think you ought to, because you don't have to. Because there's this mechanism that they built in where they depreciate the value of the home over time. And and you say, Well, how much cash did I receive over the course of the year? 7,000? Okay, well, let me depreciate the home on a particular scale, and you quickly find out that on paper it lost money. And so when you file your annual tax return, you show this is a terrible investment. I lost money all year long, and you don't pay taxes on a loss. In actuality, it produced an income that you don't pay taxes on. This is perfectly legal, this is not wrong, it's not unethical, it's just the rules that are in place by people who make the rules who happen to own real estate.
SPEAKER_01:Yes.
SPEAKER_00:You see why they make the rules that way. And then we talked about a gain. This house gained 25% on day one when you when you bought the house. And then when you go to sol it down the road, you know, three, four, or five years later, and it's worth$40,000,$50,000 more than that, now you've got a gain that you would have to pay a capital gains tax on. Except if you take this equity gain that you had, this captured equity and this increased value of the home, and you decide, hey, that was great. We owned one rental property, it did great. I'm gonna take that and turn it into two or three or four rental properties, and you buy those, and you never really got to handle the gain of it, you you can put it into another something called a 1031 exchange, won't explain it. But it works just like an IRA where you're investing in similar investments within this thing. And you never touch the money, you never spend the money, you just keep reinvesting the money. As long as you reinvest it, you will never pay a capital gains tax.
SPEAKER_01:This is some still get the cash flow. So if this sounds very complex, uh let me just say every time you get on bourgeois road over here by the church, bourgeois means wealthy landowner. You confess that. I'm a wealthy landowner. When I look at the nation of Israel all through the Old Testament, every family in Israel had their own familial land. They were landowners. I believe it is God's will for every Christian to own land, own property, own stuff. Every place the sole of your foot has tread.
SPEAKER_00:I believe you understand what you're doing for your landlord, right?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, you're paying all of this for you.
SPEAKER_00:And it's not wrong. Every time we've done this, we have provided a good and a service to somebody who needed it.
SPEAKER_01:Yes.
SPEAKER_00:And we did it better than others. We didn't get greedy with it. We had the best product because we made sure that that home was fixed up, everything was working, it was pretty, it smelled good, it worked, it was something that we wouldn't be ashamed to live into. We were happy for our renter to come in. So people would look at the home and they'd say, Wow, this is the best one in this area. It must be a whole lot more. No, we cut the price$25 a month from other properties in the area. That means every renter that wanted to rent a property in that area went through our property and looked at it and looked at the price of ours compared to others. It was better than everyone else's and it was cheaper than everyone else's. That means we got the pick of the best renter. Best product, best price means you get the best renter who's gonna take care of your property.
SPEAKER_01:There are a lot of, but raise your hand if you know someone. I won't make you out yourself, but if you know someone who has made money in rental properties, raise your hand. Yes, it is it is awesome. Make this part of your plan. There are answers for every one of your every one of your no's. There's a way for you to overcome that and turn it in. Not that you have to invest in reality. I'm not telling you you have to, I'm just saying there are so many avenues. You can learn about the marketplace.
SPEAKER_00:If you're a homeowner, get out of here. If you're a renter, aim at being a homeowner. If you're a homeowner, aim at owning other properties, owning land, becoming a landlord. Aim at that because when you move out of your first property and into your next one, it's an easy next step to rent that one out.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, you can't.
SPEAKER_00:And you'll find that was really easy. And people complain about it, the toilets, the taxes, and the tenants. If you do this right, it is a blessing. The blessing of the Lord makes one rich and adds no sorrow.
SPEAKER_01:You will have to read, you will have to learn, you will have to research.
SPEAKER_00:So there are other mechanisms, we're out of time tonight, but there's other mechanisms in the in the real estate market. Uh house flipping, that can be real exciting, and it can be real terrifying.
SPEAKER_01:It can be exciting.
SPEAKER_00:If you do it right, you can have windfall sums of money that you can turn around and invest in rental properties after that. Uh, but that requires some special know-how. Uh, you can buy a house to flip with no money out of pocket. You think, you know, the rental property I had to put 20% down. If you find a good house to flip, there's a way for you to buy that with zero money out of pocket or very little out of pocket.
SPEAKER_01:I would not do that if I were in credit card debt, though.
SPEAKER_00:Nope, this is so these are specialized things or ways to make sums of money. Uh the the the the saying that you don't get rich you know quick, don't fall for the get rich quick schemes. Uh I say don't fall for schemes, but you don't get rich slow. You get rich quick with the right things. And with a God idea, a heaven idea, with the blessing of the Lord behind it, you can become wealthy, have an abundant supply quick. You can turn your situation around.
SPEAKER_01:There are a few other we did not cover that because we don't have experience, but royalties are another passive income stream. If you write a book, if you are an artist, if you have stuff out there on, you know, it can it can turn a profit. I know, I mean, Joel Osteen doesn't take a prop doesn't take a salary from the church because he just sells all his books and he lives off of those royalties.