Ep 61: 2021 Wrap Up
The X's & O's
Brent, Matthew, and Joshua say goodbye to 2021 on this episode by highlighting their favorite moments of the year, what shocked them the most, and what they are looking forward to in the new year.
The Hosts:
Brent Pasqua, Matthew Theal and Joshua Winterswyk
Transcript:
Brent Pasqua: All right. Welcome in. Welcome to Retirement Plan Playbook. Merry Christmas, guys. Happy New Year.
Matthew Theal: Happy New Year, Brent. Happy to be here, final pod of the year.
Joshua Winterswyk: Merry Christmas. Happy New Year.
Brent Pasqua: On today’s show we’re going to discuss our favorites of 2021, and we’ll talk about what we’re excited about for 2022, and our much anticipated holiday gift guide. I’m your host, Brent Pasqua, founder of RPA Wealth Management. I’m here with Matthew Theal, certified financial planner, and Joshua Winterswyk, certified financial planner. As we kick this off, what do you guys enjoy doing on New Year’s?
Matthew Theal: I’ve been really boring, and I actually enjoy doing nothing on New Year’s. I don’t know. I feel like after the holidays everything is so stressful that New Year’s is just one of those nights where… I’m a little older now where I’d rather just stay in and relax with the family than do anything wild and crazy. Haley and I used to go see a movie and go to dinner, but now with the baby at home, that’s not happening, so we’ll probably cook a meal and just relax, maybe not go to the movies, but watch something on Netflix.
Brent Pasqua: So, will you stay up until midnight?
Matthew Theal: No, no, no. I’m in bed by 10:30.
Joshua Winterswyk: Really?
Matthew Theal: Dude, I’m the old timer of the group.
Joshua Winterswyk: That’s true.
Matthew Theal: You guys know this.
Joshua Winterswyk: That fits you.
Matthew Theal: I mean, I go to bed early.
Joshua Winterswyk: I guess I’m not surprised.
Brent Pasqua: I mean, I’m staying up until midnight.
Joshua Winterswyk: Are you?
Brent Pasqua: Yeah, of course.
Joshua Winterswyk: I usually stay up until midnight. I normally like to go to the big party, wear some nice clothes, have a couple cocktails, and enjoy myself, but this year’s changing a lot. Me and my wife are expecting, and my wife’s going to be close to her due date at that time, and so, Matt, my New Year’s is probably going to look more like yours.
Brent Pasqua: For the next five years.
Joshua Winterswyk: Yeah, probably. My normal New Year’s plans are changing rapidly.
Brent Pasqua: I mean, with my kids being five and seven, they’re now at that age where they could stay up. They can make it if we plan the day right, and it’s just exciting to be a family at that time and celebrate the new year with everyone. So, I just enjoy being with the family and keeping the kids up and having them enjoy their cousins.
Joshua Winterswyk: That’s fun, that they get to stay up now to see all the midnight festivities.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah. They’re growing into that, and it becomes fun as they get older. So, let’s get straight into the Retirement Planning Corner. We’re going to do something a little different today. We’re just going to get into the topics of the year and get ready as we start talking about next year. So, let’s start talking about what is our favorite professional moments of 2021, and why don’t you start us off?
Joshua Winterswyk: Sure, sure. I’ll go first. My favorite professional moment as I reflected on 2021 was, and really, kind of 2020, but just being there for clients in such an uncertain times. There’s just so many negative headlines, so much negative news, and to just provide some clarity and just some explanation for clients into getting them through just a really, really difficult period of our lives, and also, just staying away from being reactive to a lot of the news and changes in this landscape, and helping our clients stay emotionally consistent. So, that’s just been a really proud moment, and my favorite moment of 2021.
Matthew Theal: All right. Yeah. Well said, Josh. Along those same lines, my favorite was actually coming back to the office. So, with the way this year started, COVID was obviously at it’s peak, and it was looking really, really grim for a while, and then they started rolling out the vaccine. I think it was in the early spring, and we were all able to come back by mid May, and then into early June, and then leading into that, just seeing the two of you back here at the office was nice, and being able to do water cooler talk, but then also seeing our clients as they started coming back, those who wanted to be seen in person, it was a great experience. I really enjoyed it, and it’s much better than looking at you two over Zoom, let me tell you that.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah. I think from being and working from home for a year, you became more appreciative of what it’s like to be in the office and then have also that socialization and being able to discuss things and not having to jump on a Zoom call to discuss it, it felt more normal than 2020 felt.
Matthew Theal: Yeah, for sure.
Joshua Winterswyk: Yeah. The stay at home never felt normal. I mean, there was really difficult times, and I didn’t think I’d say this, but I kind of missed you guys here at the office, so it’s nice to be back, Matt. I agree.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah. I think that was a great moment of this year. My favorite moment this year has been seeing clients at all-time highs. Portfolio values have just done very well from 2019 to 2020, and then going into this year in 2021, to see people who have retired five, seven, 10 years ago, and who have continued to take money and distributions withdrawals to provide income and during retirement, be able to do that, but then also the ability to do whatever they want in life, and then be able to have more money than they had when they retired, for many people, that’s been a tremendous accomplishment. I think the thing that I just have enjoyed the most is you could see and sense the bit of relief that people have of even though the world’s kind of tough right now, when things get back to normal, I can travel, I can do the things, I don’t have to really worry about money as much in retirement because we’ve had a really good headstart on returns over the last couple years.
Matthew Theal: Yeah. Shout out to the people who retired in 2020, made it through. That was a tough year, but the ones who stuck with the plan made it through the other side, and they didn’t have to, hopefully, deal with the whole work-from-home chaos that everyone else did.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah. 2020 was not an easy year to retire. That’s for sure. Josh, what shocked you in 2021?
Joshua Winterswyk: I think the trickle-down effect of just all of the supply chain issues. I mean, we see all of, especially here on the West Coast, but see all of the big ships waiting to port in Los Angeles, the lack of drivers, the lack of storage, labor, which has led to just… We’ve seen higher prices, and it really paints a picture of how globalized we are now, and how we’ve even got used to having everything at our fingertips. So, COVID put a little bit of a halt to that, and even just talking about the supply chain issues specifically, it slowed down so many different areas in our lives, and just very interesting and kind of shocked that it had played such a big effect in today.
Brent Pasqua: You think it’ll correct itself next year?
Joshua Winterswyk: I think we’re on our way there. I mean, are just… Even as a country, but globally, we see that this is an issue, and we’re pretty good at solving problems. So, I do think it will. How long it’s going to be, obviously, don’t have that crystal ball to tell that, but I do think that we’re already seeing in this fourth quarter of 2021, we’re seeing some improvement, and hopefully this even helps us from this never happening again either.
Brent Pasqua: Matt, what’s your biggest shock of 2021?
Matthew Theal: Yeah. It goes along the same lines of what Josh was saying about supply chains and everything, but inflation is a big shocker. We always joke around here about how old I am, and I’ve been through a few different market cycles, and I remember back during the 2008, 2009, 2010 financial crisis, and there’s a bunch of money printing, and all the people on TV, all the smart guys that they would interview would say, “Oh, this is going to cause a massive-level inflation. It’s going to be like the Weimar Republic. Your dollars are worthless,” blah, blah, blah. They’d try and scare you, then they’d sell you some gold bars.
Matthew Theal: That inflation just never happened, but now I guess the money printing they did last year, along with the supply chains that Josh was mentioning, and the fact that nobody want to work is kind of like the perfect storm, and we actually have real inflation for the first time since the 1980s. So, that completely shocked me. Where it is right now, it’s closer to 7% than it is to 6%, so for people who are holding lots of cash, it may be a time that you might actually want to consider investing some of that money to earn a higher rate of return so you don’t lose your purchasing power. But yeah, totally shocked. I hope it does die down a little bit next year, but it is kind of looking like we might be going into a period like in the 1970s where there’s a few years of some really tough inflation numbers.
Brent Pasqua: Do you anticipate that people will need more money for income, retirees, next year?
Matthew Theal: That depends on what they’re spending their money on. If they want a new TV, probably not. If you want a new car, yeah, those are more expensive. Look at the price of used cars. There’s people who bought cars in 2018, 2019, and they’re selling them for a profit right now. It’s unheard of.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah. You could see where things just naturally are going to get more expensive, but we had a nice increase going into next year with Social Security, and that was a nice surprise for a lot of people as well.
Matthew Theal: Yeah, and the inflation numbers, I think we mentioned it on a few pods, but they are adjusting the tax brackets for 2022, so that’s good as well.
Brent Pasqua: My shocking thing that I think that happened in 2021 was just to see how much the US stock market increased. We saw a large increase in 2019 in US stocks, and then we went into 2020, we were off to a good start until about February, and then the bottom fell out from the bottom of us, and then the market just completely just struggled throughout a part of the year. I mean, it was recovering through 2020, but we saw so many things that could’ve led to many problems in the economy going into this year that could’ve challenged the returns. But we came out of COVID strong in 2020, and then we went into this year, and now the S&P 500’s up 23%, the DOW’s up 16, and then NASDAQ’s up 18, and NASDAQ had reached a high of 24. So, it’s just shocking to me that with all the challenges that not only the US has been through, but the global economy in the world, over the last two years almost now, that we could see these types of returns this year. I mean, you would think it’d be a little bit more tapered.
Matthew Theal: Yeah, and good point. It’s one of those things, though, too where when we look at where the stock market’s been, we kind of look at inflation numbers, we look at how strong the economy is. You think, okay, well, and we’ll get into more of this on shows in 2022, but we’re probably going into an environment where interest rates will be rising next year, and that could pull these great stock returns down a little bit that we’ve seen. So, it’s always important not to get too enthusiastic as you look at your brokerage statement, and stick it out for the long haul because a couple months of down returns won’t be that big of a deal five, 10 years from now.
Joshua Winterswyk: I think just emotionally, you could’ve said this year might not have had that great of returns, and that led to you changing portfolio allocation, changing investment strategy. So, we don’t know for sure, and I think it’s just a testament to what we preach here on every podcast, but also, I’m shocked at that a little bit as well.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah, and if you look at this year and you look at performance returns and what the stock market did, every single month this year you had these several days of just lower returns where the market really fell, and then it picked right back up. So, you had to be able to withstand some of that volatility all month, every single month this year, but you look at where we started and where we are, it’s somewhat surprising.
Matthew Theal: Yeah.
Brent Pasqua: As we look now towards 2022, what are you most excited about?
Joshua Winterswyk: I’m going to start, and I’m just most excited about taking another step forward. We continue to learn. We continue to battle out of this pandemic and small recession we were in that we’ve kind of recovered from, even from a market sense, but just taking that nother step forward in 2022, staying positive with that. Like I had mentioned earlier, my wife and I are expecting in 2022, so that’s what’s at the top of my mind right now. So, again, there are good things to look forward to, and I think 2022 can provide a lot of optimism as well.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah. Your life’s going to change in 2022.
Joshua Winterswyk: Yes, it is. Yeah. Everyone says for the better, though, so I’m looking forward to that.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah. You’re going to be busy.
Matthew Theal: Yeah, very busy.
Brent Pasqua: What are you most excited about, Matt?
Matthew Theal: Well, I’ve been talking about it a lot on probably the last five to 10 podcasts. I subtly mention it, but I don’t really care what you want to call it. Crypto’s kind of the old term. Web3’s the new term, but there’s a lot of innovation going on in the Web3 crypto world right now, and it’s really exciting to invest in it, to watch it unfold in realtime, and I’m really curious to see where this all goes as it becomes mainstream. If you don’t believe me, the other day it was announced that Nike, the largest athletic shoe manufacturer, purchased a company that makes NFTs, and they’re going to start rolling out some version of Nike NFTs, non-fungible tokens. We’ve talked about those on previous podcasts. It’s going to be interesting to see where it goes. Probably, this is going to be a crypto bare market at some point next year. It might’ve already started this week with some very big drops in Bitcoin and Ethereum, but it’s the future, and that’s where we’re all probably be spending our time 10 years from now.
Brent Pasqua: Did we see the biggest advancement in crypto in 2021?
Matthew Theal: I think what we saw was crypto starting to go, or Web3, they kind of want to rephrase it into Web3, mainstream, whereas there was a lot of building that took place between the bare market of ’17, ’18, ’19, and then ’20 was kind of a weird year. Then by ’21, a lot of the user applications are starting to get up and running. There’s this thing called decentralized finance where you could essential be your own bank, and you could get a coin that’s linked to the US dollar, and you could lend it out, and you can get rates of return that would keep up or beat where the inflation rate is right now. So, a lot of that stuff is really, really exciting, and it’s going to be, at the end of the day, good for consumers and good for our clients.
Joshua Winterswyk: I love the innovation, and it just seemed like for a while the Web3 or crypto space was kind of slower. They were building, a lot of promise, but in 2021, I have, from my perspective, have seen a lot of that innovation come to the forefront. So, I agree with you. I’m also excited for that.
Brent Pasqua: Should we be getting clients prepared to do their reviews in the metaverse?
Matthew Theal: I mean, yeah, we can if we get them the goggles from Facebook. What’s it called, the Oculus headset? They could wear those, and they could see us and be in our conference room, which would actually be pretty cool because then we could use our whiteboard.
Brent Pasqua: So, we do virtual reality reviews in the metaverse with clients?
Matthew Theal: Yeah.
Joshua Winterswyk: So, no more boring just Zoom calls where you’re sitting at a desk.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah.
Matthew Theal: I mean, it’s going to be kind of tough to get up there, but yeah, I think that’s the future. In the next five years we’re going to be doing that.
Brent Pasqua: The thing that I’m excited for for 2022 is probably people just being able to travel more, and some sense of maybe what they didn’t or weren’t able to do in 2021 that maybe at some point, and I know right now it’s not looking outstanding for that, but maybe at some point in 2022 people can travel with more comfort, and maybe they can get on a cruise ship, and I know a lot of people have had trips that they’ve continued to postpone and hold off and wait for, and there’s a lot of things that a lot of people want to do, and I just hope 2022 brings that for a lot of people because life is short, and we want to see everybody enjoy it, and from the 2020 and 2021, a lot of people didn’t get to do the things that they really enjoy doing, and I’m just hopeful and excited that possibly that can get started next year.
Matthew Theal: I’m not a cruiser. Are cruise ships going? I haven’t been paying attention.
Brent Pasqua: I think they are in a limited capacity, but I don’t know to what level. I know a lot of people are holding off on a lot of the cruises that they’ve already either prepaid for or planned out. So, hopefully they get really going, but it’s not sounding very optimistic right now that that’s going to be a full go next year.
Joshua Winterswyk: Yeah. Hopefully they are, though. So many people like cruises, and it’s just a great way to, even just with your spouse or family and friends, so hopefully that does take off a little bit more next year, they can find a safe way for people to start cruising more.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah. I think travel just brings so much enjoyment and a break from life, and people do have more money now, and if they can utilize that to take their family or grandkids, kids on trips, I hope that people get to be able to do that part of their life that they truly enjoy.
Joshua Winterswyk: Yeah, absolutely.
Brent Pasqua: What’s next for clients at RPA?
Joshua Winterswyk: I’ll start again here. So, we have actually two big updates planned just from a company standpoint. We have our website being redone, so that’s going to be exciting. So, be on the lookout for those updates, and then also, our clients have access to a performance portal that they’re able to log into from Orion, and we’re looking to upgrade that as well. So, two big pieces of software or a website and a piece of software that’s getting upgraded for not only anyone interested to check in more about us, and also our clients. So, excited for that.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah. I think the client portals are outstanding for people to be able to track performance and run data on their reports, and then just making it as simple and user-friendly as possible, and then also visually nice.
Joshua Winterswyk: Yeah. The custodians just don’t do a good job of tracking performance and seeing how each position’s doing, and just kind of… If you wanted to look under the hood of your portfolio a little bit more, we just have found that the custodians just aren’t very good at that and sharing that information with clients. So, excited about the updates.
Brent Pasqua: Matt, I think yours is surprising, I guess. Why don’t you tell them what you have up next for RPA?
Matthew Theal: Yeah, shocker. Matt’s been spending his time trying to get RPA clients access to crypto markets, so that’s something that we hope to roll out sometime next year for clients, is a cryptocurrency solution. I’m not really sure what it’ll look like right now, as we’re kind of in the early research stages, but I think it’s important. Just like with investing, how some people like to do it themselves, and others want an advisor to help, same with cryptocurrency. Some people like to pick their own. Others want an advisor to help, and we want to be here as an advisor to help people who want access to those markets.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah. Crypto’s not going away, and instead of just trying to ignore it or see other people become successful with it, and just sit back on the sidelines, that’s just not our strategy. We’d rather get involved and get in the… It’s still in the rather early stages of development. We’d rather be part of that than being left behind, and I think there’s a lot of opportunity in the crypto market for us to join.
Matthew Theal: Yeah. There’s not a lot of investment advisors who are offering that to their clients, so I know a couple other firms, but we’d be one of the first.
Brent Pasqua: Right, and this is people who want to have some exposure to it. We’re not recommending that a large portion of someone’s retirement is in the crypto market, but I think having the ability to have that exposure is very important.
Matthew Theal: Absolutely. I agree.
Brent Pasqua: The other things that I have ready for things that we’re looking forward to next year is we’re going to be revamping our portfolio performance reports. I think client deliverables are extremely important, and I think having detail in what we deliver to clients is critical, and we’re just going to be continuing to work on how viewer-friendly the performance reports are, and all the reports that we create for people. So, I think that’s a critical aspect that… I get bored of reports looking the same very quickly, and so I like to change them and make them better and enhance them. I’ve been bored of them for part of this year, so I’m ready to make those changes, and we’re working on those.
Brent Pasqua: Then the other thing is we’re probably going to be hiring somebody next year. I think we’re ready to take that step. Last year, it was really challenging to try to even think about bringing somebody in with all the COVID restrictions and the training and the confidentiality issues that we have to deal with as the type of firm that we are, but bringing somebody in next year would probably be very helpful for us, so I think that’s really on our to-do list and a priority for next year.
Matthew Theal: Yeah, we’re excited. I’d love to get a new coworker. I think it’ll be fun, and if you know of anybody who wants to work in the industry, don’t hesitate to send them to us, have them send their resume, and we’d love to give them an interview.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah. So, big things happening. We’re always moving forward, and we’ve always got our eyes on things that we need to be developing and working on, and making sure that not only the client experience is outstanding, but also, that we’re giving the best to people, and that’s what our goal is. As we get into the last of the RPA Recommends, we want to get the gift guide out. Well, we have selected a gift from… We’ve had our wives tell us each one of their gifts, and we’ve selected one of our own. So, why don’t we start? Matt, if you want to get started on this one, what is your gift guide, and what is one from your wife, Haley?
Matthew Theal: I should make a job about how I’m just going to talk about crypto, but I’m not going to talk about crypto right now.
Joshua Winterswyk: Oh, I was hoping he’d pick me first. I was going to steal crypto from you in the gift guide.
Matthew Theal: Well, I’m not going to talk about crypto. Oh, but actually, if you want to keep your coin safe, check out… No, I’m just kidding. All right. So, I’ve been spending a lot of time on the golf course. Josh, you’re in my golfing group, and one thing I’ve wanted is a practice putting mat. So, that’s on my list this year, the perfect putt practice mat, basically.
Joshua Winterswyk: Those look nice.
Matthew Theal: Yeah.
Joshua Winterswyk: Yeah. I don’t have one, but those look nice.
Matthew Theal: I definitely need to improve my short game, and that is supposedly the best putting mat out there.
Joshua Winterswyk: Could you use some recommendations too if anyone’s listening that has a better putting mat, right?
Matthew Theal: Yeah, absolutely.
Joshua Winterswyk: But that’s an interesting gift. That might be on my list too.
Brent Pasqua: Did your wife have a gift, or did you already say it?
Matthew Theal: No. I mean, do you want me to roll through all three?
Brent Pasqua: Yeah, let’s do them.
Matthew Theal: Okay, and then she likes this brand, they make leather goods and nice clothes. It’s called Cuyana, and it’s based in LA, and she really likes their sweaters, so she has a few of their sweaters on the list. I was trying to buy her one, but the one thing I’ll say is it looks like they’re all sold out, which is pretty common among a lot of small retailers right now. But yeah, check it out if you’re into that, and then Charlotte is 15, 16 months old. She is getting a kitchen-
Brent Pasqua: Oh, nice.
Matthew Theal: … so one of those toy kitchens to play with, so hopefully she’ll like it. I feel like that’s kind of the age kids start to get those.
Joshua Winterswyk: Fun.
Matthew Theal: Absolutely.
Joshua Winterswyk: She’ll be cooking with you, huh? Put that kitchen in the kitchen next to you?
Matthew Theal: Yeah, yeah.
Brent Pasqua: I mean, that’s neat because that’s just a gift that she’ll use all the way until she’s five or six years old, or seven years old. I mean, they love that at that age.
Matthew Theal: Yeah.
Brent Pasqua: Josh, what do you have for us?
Joshua Winterswyk: I was going to steal the crypto thing. On Coinbase, so Coinbase is one of the crypto custodians, they are actually offering a digital gift card, so if anyone’s out there that wants to gift cryptocurrency, since Matt talked about it this whole episode, you can actually do that now. So, that’s pretty cool, a pretty cool gift if you’re looking for something a little different. I was also going the golf route, though. I recently got a new golf speaker. It’s the Bushnell Wingman, and it actually connects to your golf cart. So, it plays music while you’re playing golf, and then if you press the button on it, or it has the button that can actually disconnect and you can carry it with you, the speaker will read your yardage through a GPS system anywhere on the course. So, I recently just got that as a gift, love it, very cool, so check that out, the Wingman for the golf lovers.
Matthew Theal: You’re going to have to let me borrow that this winter and spring while we’re on the course, and don’t know if you’re going to be on the course as much, so maybe I’ll just have to swing by and borrow that from you.
Joshua Winterswyk: Yeah, a new baby might delay my golf start this spring.
Matthew Theal: I’ll trade you my putting mat for it since that’s about all you’ll be able to do.
Joshua Winterswyk: But hey, that’s an even trade. Okay.
Brent Pasqua: I do have the time to play golf. I just probably won’t be playing golf.
Joshua Winterswyk: Yeah, that’s what we figured.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah.
Joshua Winterswyk: But if you want to borrow my Wingman too, you can do it while-
Brent Pasqua: Thanks, man.
Joshua Winterswyk: … I’m going to be shelved while my little baby’s being born. But my wife, gift from her that she put on there, the company Birkenstock, do you know the company Birkenstock?
Brent Pasqua: Yeah.
Joshua Winterswyk: Okay. It always reminds me of… I feel like my uncles wore Birkenstocks 30 years ago, the sandals with socks underneath, but they’ve made a reemergence over the last couple years, and they do a clog. It’s almost like a home slipper with wool lining, so really nice, wife loves them, walking around the house, especially as it’s getting colder and spending more time at home. So, check out Birkenstocks if you’re looking for a house slipper/clog for your spouse.
Brent Pasqua: That’s a good idea. The gift that my wife recommended was Barefoot Dreams. It’s a throw blanket that they have. They’re actually really popular. I think a lot of their colors are already sold out, but they’re, I guess, super popular right now, probably part of the supply chain issue that we’re having, but she said they’re great blankets, and it sounds like there’s a lot of people that use them. Have you heard of them?
Matthew Theal: Yeah. I think I have three or four of them.
Brent Pasqua: You would.
Matthew Theal: I actually think when Haley was working at a various Hollywood studio that they did a promo with them, and we got a bunch of them for free. Literally, one year I think I had like eight of them at my house, and we ended up giving a bunch away and keeping some for ourselves, but we need more.
Joshua Winterswyk: I’m on their site, and they look like they have pullovers and jackets that look really comfy too, kind of home attire.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah. You could put one, I think, that wears like a shirt or a jacket where you just… It’s like a blanket or an overthrow that keeps you warm.
Joshua Winterswyk: I might use this recommendation.
Matthew Theal: Yeah, this is definitely the brand, and these are great, so I highly recommend these. Plus one on this one.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah. She said the CozyChic throw blanket is her favorite. Then for me, my recommendation is anything Lululemon. I know we’ve mentioned it on the pod many times, but their winter attire, their golf attire, their outing attire is really outstanding. It’s really good quality, and especially as we’re in the winter season right now, they just have a lot of really nice clothing that will make you look nice when you go out, or if you’re even just around the house. It is on the pricier side, but at the end of the day, more expensive clothes will last you a little bit longer, so might as well spend a little extra dollars on it, and it’ll last you longer and you look nicer wearing it. But Lululemon is a great outstanding, both for workout and at home stuff.
Matthew Theal: Sorry, Brent. I was going through this Barefoot Dreams. I didn’t realize they had all this men stuff too. This looks pretty nice. Looks like the blanket, but with pants.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah. They have a lot of nice stuff.
Matthew Theal: Yeah. Good recommend.
Brent Pasqua: Well, that came from my wife, so…
Matthew Theal: What about the kids? Are you not going to say what the kids are getting?
Brent Pasqua: Oh, I forgot about that. So, the kids want all their normal action figure toys, the kid toys, stuff that they want, but the one thing that they keep talking about is they want an electrical little vehicle for the backyard so that they have more stuff to do in the backyard, and they also want new bikes for the backyard. So, they want a lot of that outdoors, backyard stuff. We redid the backyard this year, and so now that that’s done, it gives them a lot more ability to be playing outside, and we’re excited for that.
Joshua Winterswyk: Yeah, that’s cool. The new bikes is probably cool. Are you going to get a bike too, you guys can go riding together?
Brent Pasqua: No. I probably won’t get a bike, but it’s a good idea if they’re going to be riding longer distances. I mean, they’re getting to that age where I could probably be riding a bike with them.
Joshua Winterswyk: They’re probably going to want you to ride with them once you get them those new bikes.
Matthew Theal: Actually, I’ve known you for a long time, and I don’t know if I’ve ever seen you ride a bike.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah. Well, when we go down to the beach we’ll ride bikes down there.
Matthew Theal: Oh, beach cruisers. That’s right.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah.
Matthew Theal: That’s when I would’ve seen it.
Joshua Winterswyk: I’ve seen him ride a spin bike.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah.
Matthew Theal: Yeah, I have seen him… Yeah. That makes sense.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah.
Matthew Theal: Yeah.
Brent Pasqua: But yeah, it is something to think about as the kids start enjoying riding more, but I enjoy riding at the beach. I don’t know if you guys do too.
Matthew Theal: Yeah.
Brent Pasqua: All right. So, as we close out 2021 and we look towards 2022, is there any parting thoughts or things that you’re thinking about for next year?
Matthew Theal: I’m just expecting anything at this point. I think most people probably are. So, from an economic standpoint, I think next year’s going to be pretty interesting, probably a lot more bumps in the road than we’ve had the last few years. From a virus standpoint, I have no idea, but hopefully, it’s a fun year for everybody.
Joshua Winterswyk: Yeah. Keep the optimistic thoughts, right? There’s just a lot of good things to look forward to next year, and let’s take that step forward.
Brent Pasqua: Yeah. I think everything’s pointing towards cautious and not as much optimistic, but I think we don’t need to look at it that way. Let’s just be optimistic towards next year and hope next year’s even better than 2021 and 2020, and hopefully, we’re further in 2022 than we were from 2020.
Joshua Winterswyk: What’d you say, Matt? Hopefully, 2020’s not 2022?
Matthew Theal: Yeah, because 2022 sounds like 2020 part two.
Joshua Winterswyk: Yeah, yeah. Let’s hope that doesn’t happen.
Brent Pasqua: So, as advisors we love helping people, and that’s why we do it. If you’d like to schedule an appointment with any of us, please go to rpawealth.com and schedule a complimentary consultation. You can also download our eBook on our website. If you’d like the show notes, please go to retirementplanplaybook.com. We just want to wish all the listeners Merry Christmas, happy holidays, happy New Year, and wishing everyone a blessed and safe New Year and a welcome to 2022.
Joshua Winterswyk: Merry Christmas. Happy New Year.
Matthew Theal: Thank you.
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