Episode Transcript

# FA Episode 10 - Jack Oujo

Speakers: Craig Andrews, Jack Oujo

[00:00 - 01:45] Craig Andrews:
You never know how much time you have. For me, that stopped being an idea and became reality on August 22nd,
2021. The doctors put me on a ventilator and told my wife to call hospice so she could prepare for the day
they planned to pull the plug. Six weeks later, I woke up to an entirely different reality. I could not walk,
I could not talk, I could not even lift my own arm, and I woke up realizing something else, I had not made the
right preparations for my family. The plans I thought were pretty good fell through when it mattered most.
That is why fiduciary alchemy welcomes voices that would have warned me about the holes in my plans. My hope
is that you live a long and prosperous life, but I also hope you make better plans than I did. So tune in,
take notes, and stay with us through the end when bluesman Grindle and the compliance choir. Giving a word of
caution. Today I want to welcome Jack Oujo. He is the founder of Oujo Wealth Strategies. They are one of the
nation's largest tax-focused wealth management firms. He's also the author of the book Too Smart to Be an
Umpire. Now before all this, he spent eight years as a professional umpire in the minor leagues, advancing the
Triple-A. He's also been an advanced tax top producer for 25 years, and the number one producer for 10
consecutive years. Today he shares how tax expertise and persistence built a multi-generational advisory
practice. Jack, welcome.

[01:45 - 01:49] Jack Oujo:
It's a pleasure to talk to you today, Craig. I'm excited to speak with you.

[01:49 - 02:24] Craig Andrews:
Yeah. Well, I tell you what, one of the things that really caught my eye was when I saw you were a minor
league umpire. And I love, well, I haven't been to a minor league game in a while, but I love the concept of
minor league. I feel like Major League Ball has gotten out of the hands, out of the reach of your average
American and minor league, it feels like it should have been. It feels like what Major League should have
been.

[02:24 - 03:04] Jack Oujo:
Yeah. I always said the problem with the minor leagues is that it's called the minor leagues. You have some of
the best baseball players in the world just short of the Major League level. So the talent is really
incredible. There's a fine line between people in the minor leagues and the people in the Major leagues. And
because they're not making any money, it allows the fans to attend the games at a very, very reasonable price.
And there's a lot of entertainment for kids. And I've been a season ticket holder for the Lakewood, New Jersey
team for many years. We give a lot of the tickets to our clients, but it's a cheap way to have a lot of fun,
especially if you love baseball. Yeah.

[03:04 - 03:18] Craig Andrews:
And I saw them rally and I would go to Durham Bulls games. And I saw Andrew Jones in Durham, the same season
he got called up and he hit a home right in the World Series. Yeah. Yeah. It's pretty cool.

[03:18 - 03:53] Jack Oujo:
When I was in, I remember when I was in double A, I had Jose Canteco in Huntsville. And I didn't know of his
future stardom and he had a home run one time and I was behind the plate. And when he hit it, I just out loud
went, "Holy shit, me and the catcher, I'm shocked that somebody can hit the ball that far." It was like, you
know, I'm dating myself. The old Munsters episode, when Herman Munster was trying out for the Dodgers, he had
a ball so far. But I was blessed in the minor leagues when I was there to see a lot of future big leaguers,
many whole famers. Yeah.

[03:53 - 04:48] Craig Andrews:
Well, it was amazing. You know, I live on the south side of Austin, our minor league teams up in Round Rock
and that's an honorous drive so I don't go up there. But the, you know, when I saw Andrew Jones, I paid seven
bucks. I'm sitting there watching, you know, like you said, world-class ball for seven bucks. We have the
Lakewood Blue Claws tickets that we have are, or now they're called the Jersey Shore Blue Claws, I believe. I
think we pay $1,500 a year for four-season tickets, five rows behind home plate. We also have a low-life New
York Jets fans and I think that's about what we pay for four tickets for one game to see the Jets over $1,000.
So certainly entertainment value there for the average person seeing a minor league game, that's for sure.
Yeah. Do you know who John Spolstra is?

[04:48 - 04:50] Jack Oujo:
No, that rings a bell.

[04:50 - 05:34] Craig Andrews:
Well, his son is the coach of the Miami Heat. - Okay. - Switching. - Work's both right, yeah. - Yeah, yeah. -
My name, yeah. - So John Dil, as a matter of fact, he was with the New Jersey Nets. I realize we're switching
sports, but I'm gonna switch back to baseball. He was with the New Jersey Nets in the late '90s, and he's a
marketer, and he packed the stands. But when he left basketball, he got into minor league baseball. And what's
the team out, Staten Island? That was one of the first teams he started working with. - And Alan Yankees. -
Yeah. - Yeah, I believe that's who they are, yeah. - So he's the one that brought the LED back wall to
baseball.

[05:34 - 06:33] Jack Oujo:
- Oh, wow, wow, very interesting. I remember when I was in the minor leagues, I asked Bob Rich. People may
remember Coffee Rich was a creamer and Buffalo Bill Stadium, he used to be called Rich Stadium after the
family. And I went to him, 'cause I was a poor minor league umpire. I said, "Tell me, how does somebody go
about owning a minor league team?" And they drew over a million fans in Buffalo. And he looks at me and he
goes, "You know, Jack, it really wasn't that hard." He goes, "I bought the Wichita Arrows for $250,000 in
Candace." I then convinced the politicians and the taxpayers to build and pay for a stadium that I did not pay
for. Then I simply moved the team here. And if you think about it, the major leagues are paying for the
players. So I have tickets, people coming in, I have concessions, and it's just a money machine. And that's
when I really started to understand that I was on the wrong side of capitalism as a minor league umpire when
he was practically laughing at what an easy business it was. And they've been a very successful franchise in
the minor leagues.

[06:33 - 06:40] Craig Andrews:
- Yeah, wow. So how did you go from baseball to wealth management?

[06:40 - 09:38] Jack Oujo:
- Well, my story is that it sounds weird, but it was actually very practical. When I was going to college, my
parents had no money to send me to college. And my next door neighbor growing up was a guy named Ed Sanneke.
He played for the Philadelphia Phillies, one of the few people in major league baseball history at a home run
in his first at bat off of Rip Sewell. And he umpire as a hobby, and he knew I was a high school catcher on a
state championship team. And he said, "Jack, I think you'd be a terrific umpire, you're behind the plate, and
I think you'd be good at it." And I go, "I don't want to get yelled at, that sounds horrible." And he goes,
"Well, what else are you going to do to make money?" So I took this advice, I took up umpire, and I ended up
liking it a lot, paid for a lot of expenses when I was in college. And by the time I graduated college, I was
umpire in state finals. College of signers were trying to sneak me on college games. The major league umpire,
Bill Kunkel, saw me work and said, "If you were in the major leagues now, you'd be one of the best ones." All
this positive stuff. So I graduated from Seton Hall with a degree in accounting. And I figured, "Well, let me
give this a try." The major leagues is a pipe dream, but I'll just go try out just so that when I'm the age I
am now, I wouldn't have any regrets in life. And I went to umpire school, not expecting anything, and they
took me. And I ended up going through the minor leagues very, very, very quickly. I only spent two years in a
ball before I went to AA, which is almost unheard of for an umpire. I made it to AAA. My contract was bought
after my fourth season, and it started to get really, really serious. And I ended up getting released after,
if you had three years in AAA and the big leagues didn't take you, they put in a policy where you got
released. And my problem was I beat a lot of people who just recently retired with long careers. I got to AAA
too quick, I believe, in retrospect. But anyway, I formed an accounting business, and then I realized I'm
doing tax returns, and I'm seeing these stockbrokers screw in so many people. And I was always interested on
the investment side, and I got into wealth management, and the business just crushed. It just took off. And I
realized that when I got released from baseball, I decided to reinvent myself through education. My wife and I
sat down, and I spent three and a half to four years. I passed all four parts of the CPA exam the first time I
sat for it. After being in a minor leagues eight years, I passed a certified financial planner exam. I got a
master's degree in taxation, securities, and insurance license. And I was thinking, if I'm going to go into
business, I want to be better than everybody else. I want to start with good equipment, which is knowledge.
And then I'm going to try to take lessons I learned from baseball and incorporate them into business, and
let's see where this goes. And it ended up no pun intended being a home run.

[09:38 - 09:50] Craig Andrews:
So it's awesome. Great. Yeah. So, you know, you go ahead, go ahead. So you said that you saw the stockbrokers
screwing people. What was it you saw that bothered you?

[09:50 - 11:31] Jack Oujo:
Schedule D gains and losses. There were a lot of losses on schedule D. And I just didn't think and it's
anecdotal. I'm just looking at the tax returns of the people I worked on. And I also realized that that the
broker over at ABC brokerage firm is driving around in a boat and a boat and they were thought they were
making a lot more money with a lot less expertise. And I thought if you could combine accounting with
investing, that could be a really good thing. Now back in the early 90s, CPAs were not allowed to accept
commissions. So, you know, my partner and I at the time helped change New Jersey law to allow CPAs to accept
commissions. I write about that my book to smart to be an umpire. I read about a Texas CPA named Herb Vest,
who was trying to make this happen. And he ended up starting a firm that I became affiliated with for many
years. He was like the pioneer in CPAs getting involved in the wealth management side. And there's really been
no competition in this field. The accounting profession is basically a paranoid profession in that you're
taking historical data, turning it into a financial statement and being petrified about being sued for it. And
now you're asking those same people to predict the future. And they just can't get over that hurdle. And I got
over the hurdle 30 years ago, and I found it to be almost a competition free business, being able to take tax
and accounting knowledge and bring the investment world into that, if you will. Yeah, it's, you know, one of
the

[11:31 - 11:48] Craig Andrews:
things, one of my frustrations with CPAs is I'm the one going to them with tax ideas, with tax deduction
ideas. I had to go to my CPA with the with the Augusta role. And I'm like, hey, have you heard the Augusta
role? And he's like, Oh, yeah, I'm like, why am I telling you? And

[11:48 - 12:31] Jack Oujo:
and then more. Well, that's just it getting out in front of people. And you know, I remember the comedian
George Carlin, and George Carlin said, it's my job to think of goofy shit. And I said that to my clients, it's
my job, not goofy shit, but to think of out of the box ideas to help people achieve their goals, and then use
the tax law, where appropriate to your advantage to help people. And again, I've said it many times, taxes
come in second place to making good decisions. But if you could do things with the tax law, legitimately,
legally, morally, ethically, that help people, you want to be the one coming up with the ideas, not the
client, that's for sure.

[12:31 - 12:55] Craig Andrews:
Well, and the thing that hits me is, you know, if you're buying an equity, or if you're buying a basket of
equities, you know, and you're getting 10, 12% return, you're pretty happy. But it's uncertain. If you go in
and you do the same thing in tax, you can get some pretty amazing returns, that's a lot more certain.
Absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, you can combine both of them. You make a

[12:55 - 18:37] Jack Oujo:
lot of people very happy. You, I found though, what I was able to bring to the world, and it ended up working,
was instead of focusing on promising people eight to 10% a year, because I think that's full hardy, full
hardy, because that rarely happens, by the way, if you go back and look at S&P 500 performance, the market
rarely performs in any one year at high single digits, even though that's what everybody prognosticates at the
beginning of the year, I focused on worst case scenarios for people. So if somebody was my client, I would
project out the next 15 or 20 years, and I would put in there, what would have happened if the depression
happened again? What would happen if 1999 to 2008 occurs? We would look at worst case scenarios to see if the
strategies we were putting in would help sustain people into their retirement, because I found that most
people just want to know if they're going to make it. The media puts out, you have to be the S&P 500, and it
gets people to do decisions that are not in their best interest, in my view. My sports background, when I'm
dealing with clients, is we just want to win, okay, and I would have to coach people on that. Are you trying
to be the S&P 500, or do you want to make sure you don't run out of money when you're 85 years of age? Like,
what are we trying to freaking accomplish here? And by focusing on worst case scenarios, when 1999 to 2002
occurred, in 2008 occurred, the strategies I put in for our clients helped sustain them. We didn't lose
anybody during those periods, and we were picking up people left and right. So I write a whole chapter about
that in my book, the chapter's called It's The Income Stupid, and you have to be able to protect people when
things are bad. That was the key for our success, in my view, on the investment side. As you were talking
about that, actually, a baseball ball story came to mind. It kind of reminded me of the money ball story of,
hey, we're not out to hit home runs. We're going to win by reliably getting one base. Yes, exactly. And to
draw a baseball analogy, if you're a nerdy baseball fan like me, if you're winning a baseball game, eight to
nothing in the top of the ninth inning, any other team as runners on second and third base with nobody out,
are you moving the infield in to prevent a run from being scored? Are you playing the infield back to get it
out? You're playing the infield back because all you want to do is win the freaking game. And the media has
taught people, oh, no, you have to win eight to nothing. You have to crush your opponent. And in sports, Bobby
Knight wrote a book called The Power of Negative Thinking. And he wrote a whole book on how he thought
basketball games were lost, rather than being won. And in baseball, if you look at a box for the game, teams
lose usually because of one bad inning. Golfers lose tournaments because of one bad hole. And I wanted to make
sure that my clients didn't endanger their retirement because of one bear market or one bad, one bad
investment, if you will. So a big lesson in sports is learning how to win and take a win. I said before, as a
Jets fan, everybody knows, Joe Nameth was the MVP of Super Bowl III. Many people don't know that he didn't
throw one pass in the fourth quarter of that game. He did what he had to do to get the win. Okay, that's a
name synonymous with success. Iconic football player didn't throw one freaking pass in the fourth quarter.
Okay, people don't remember that now. And so with my clients, I've tried to because a lot of people in
retirement, they became millionaires. And now that they've been comfortable with the stock market, they might
get too comfortable with the stock market and they need to reel it in. Younger people that are in their 30s
are watching the freaking 401k every day, not realizing they should be probably fully invested that they got
so much time on their hands, they should be embracing market declines. So people are different. They're in
different stages of life, and they have to do what they have to do to win at their own financial game and my
idea. Yeah, you know, there's something else. There's a baseball analogy. And it's fine. I'm not big baseball
fan, but there's some really interesting lessons I find. One of them I talk about is the margin of excellence.
And I'll ask, I'll ask folks, I'll say there's 750 batters in the major leagues. How many do you think batted
over 300? And you'd be shocked the range of answers I get. And they'll ask them, how many batted below 200?
And again, people get that wrong. And the punch line is very, very few bad above 300, you know, like potential
Hall of Famers, you bat below 200, you're getting sent down to the minors. And so like the difference between
being the best of the best and almost out of a job is out of 10 times at bat, just count base one more time.
It's a very small percentage. You know, to bring that to the investment world, if you look at, and I'm being
nerdy here, but if you look at withdrawal rates, okay, if somebody would have invested 100% of their money in
the S&P 500 in 1999 and withdrew at 7%, at some point they would have ran out of money. And if they withdrew
at 4%, they would have done very well for themselves. So those small percentages for investors, whether it's
expense ratios, I think the big thing is withdrawal rates for retirees, they become a big deal too, getting
back to winning at their own game, if you will. Yeah, I want to ask you, so you know, that lesson of one of
your interviews on money morning radio, I heard you say a few things that

[18:37 - 18:48] Craig Andrews:
really intrigued me. And the first thing I wanted to talk about was you're a big fan of paying off the
mortgage, get the mortgage paid off, get that behind you. What's what you're thinking there?

[18:48 - 27:17] Jack Oujo:
Well, it has to be done properly. If somebody's in their 30s and 40s, I would rather have them max out their
401(k) plan and do the right things first before they reduce their mortgage debt. It is a goal for most
clients in my practice to have their mortgage paid off by the time they retire, if you will. I'm not opposed
to these people out there with two or three percent mortgages to hold on to them. That's not a problem for me.
It's for the most part, most part, I want people to have their mortgages paid off. And the reason for that is
from a tax point of view, the standard deduction for a married couple is over $30,000 right now. So if you
have a $500,000 mortgage and you're at 5% interest, that's $25,000 a year in mortgage interest, you have your
real estate taxes and some charity, you're barely getting to that number. Most people are not getting to get
the deduction from mortgage interest because their standard deduction is so high. They think they're getting
this great tax right off when under tax reform, when President Trump came in, that really isn't the case
anymore. So there's not a big tax advantage for doing that. The second thing is when you're leveraging your
mortgage against the stock market in retirement, not for people in their 30s and 40s, but for people in
retirement, the stock market often has long periods of time of zero performance. So if you're retiring at 65
and we have another 1999 to 2008 on our hands, 1929 to 1944, the Arab oil embargo in the 1970s, you're seeing
your money go down in value and you're paying interest, that's a really bad thing to have happened. The
market's gone down five times by almost 50% in the last 100 years. There's 100 houses in your neighborhood and
five of them were burning down, you would make sure you had to write insurance in place, if you will. I think
it's too big of a risk to be carrying a mortgage in retirement and then having to pay for groceries during a
bear market and still pay mortgage interest. I think it's a huge mistake. I was proven right on it in 2008.
And for people in our 30s and 40s, I don't have a problem with it. I don't have a problem with it for people
that have pensions, especially if they have cost of living increases. I have a problem with people having
mortgages, they're leveraging it against the stock market in retirement. This bit, I'm going to make 8% to 10%
a year, it shakes out that way over long periods of time, but it's, if you, and I put these returns actually
in too smart to be in on par, I outlined the last 30 years of performance. People can look for themselves and
see what the S&P 500 did every year. So I, and I also think a lot of market returns come from behavior, the
behavior of the investor. And when the stock market goes down 20 or 30% and you're paying mortgage interest,
people panic, and that's when they sell. We, we're managing $800 million, because when the stock market goes
down 10 or 20%, we may get one or two phone calls in a six-week period of time. Okay, not six hours, six
weeks, because people have been coached through those scenarios and they know they're okay with the way we've
arranged their finances. So you're not getting the tax deduction that you think you're getting, and at the
worst possible time for you to take on risk in your 60s and 70s, I just think the mortgage payment is, is like
a bond equivalent, if you will. And again, I write a whole, I write a chapter and a half on the mortgage
interest deduction in my book, but there's always exceptions. So I'm not, it's not an absolute, but it's like
a 90% in my book. Well, let me throw something out. It was a recent decision I made, and you're most welcome
to say, "Hey, Craig, I think you made a mistake. That won't bother me." But, but, you know, we just, we moved
back in December and I took out a small mortgage on our new house. And the thought was basically this. You
know, I follow some economists there saying, "Hey, this, this will be," they've been protecting high inflation
forever for 16 years or more. And they say that, you know, the taming of the current inflation is just
temporary. It's going to start checking up again. And remember, one of my professors in school said,
inflationary times were great times to be borrowers. And I'm sitting there, I'm looking at this chunk of
money, I said, decided I'd rather invest that in my business, because I think I can use that to grow my
business while the, you know, while I'm expecting inflation to kind of tick up. So the real value of that, of
that expense will be shrinking with time. And that was kind of the basis of my decision. And if you think it
was a bad decision, please tell me. I don't think that's a bad decision. I think borrowing to expand your
business is a smart decision because you'll, you'll make a lot more money on the business and that, that
interest that you're paying will be poultry. That's a very practical reason for doing that. I started my
business, I borrowed on credit cards, because nobody had any money to give me. So you have this guy yelling at
you to pay off your mortgage, it's borrowing on fricking credit cards to start his business. You do what you
have to do to get rolling. Okay, what I believe would be a mistake is if you find yourself 70 years of age and
the house is paid off, and you're ready to sell the business or retire from the business, and then see
somebody on CNBC going, I think the market's going to go up 15% a year for the next seven years, and you take
out a big mortgage on your house. That I would be fighting with you on. For the reason you did it, I'm
comfortable with it. Okay. Yeah, so it's not an absolute, it's for the most part type of advice. Well, and I
think that's kind of the point. That's why folks need folks like you and their lives is it's, it's not a
simple, I mean, and this is not a dig on Dave Ramsey. I think Dave Ramsey's done amazing things, but Dave
Ramsey's advice is simple compact for the masses. I like Dave Ramsey, but I think he goes too far on the
mortgage interest, mortgage interest point. Again, my house is, I have not had, I'm 67, I haven't had a
mortgage on my house in 25 years, living in this big fancy place here in South Florida. When I tell people I
have no mortgage on it, they're very surprised by it. There's no debt. I realize that a lot of people having
done tax returns over the years that are big fans of the mortgage interest deduction don't have any money.
They think they're leveraging it against something else. And I see they have no money or investments in their
life. I think of all the money that my wife and I have saved over time by not paying mortgage interest. And
now we have lots of money. Okay, there's tons of money we receive in interest is a tremendous amount of money
now because it starts to go the other way. And I also think when people, because I've seen it, when people pay
off their mortgage, it makes them feel good that that part of their life is done with. Now they go to another
phase. They've maxed out their 401ks and now they build up a brokerage account or some other type of
investment that builds up into a nice pile of money. And going back to the tax point of view, when people in
their 60s, 70s, 80s and are withdrawing money, if they have non IRA money that's invested in municipal bonds
and tax favored dividends, they can get that money out along with IRA money. They could probably withdraw at
about $150,000 to $200,000 a year and still stay in the 12% tax bracket or less if they manage those
withdrawals properly. So I'm very sensitive to taxes, but mortgages and people do the math. They're going to
see the mortgage really isn't helping them all that much. Yeah, yeah, no, I agree. And for me, it was just
simply that of I'm expecting inflation to start ticking up again. And I feel like I can do more with that
money in my business. 100, you're, I have no issue with that at all. In fact, I'd probably be encouraging you
to do the same thing. I'm a type of advisor out there that likes to say yes. You know, as a parent when your
kids ask you something, it's always safe to say no, you can never get in true. No, you can't stay out past 11
o'clock tonight. There's there's nothing wrong with that. You're not getting in trouble by saying I tried to
find a way to yes. And I tried to talk people through it where maybe they would come to the conclusion that it
was a bad idea. But what you're doing it,

[27:17 - 28:34] Craig Andrews:
I would have no problem with it and I'd be cheering you on probably. Oh, that's good. That's that's
encouraging. So the other thing that I heard you talk about was whole life insurance. And I've gone a little
bit of a gyration. You know, I heard the Dave Ramsey advice, which is never get whole life. And then I had
some clients that talked about and they, you know, the first thing they told me was most people selling whole
life or crooked. They're maxing out their, their commission and they're not putting together the best, the
best plan. They say, you know, we usually do 50, 50 premium and paid up editions. And they say, and they
openly say, it doesn't make sense for everybody. And then I run in some infinite bankers and they, you know,
just thinking about them, they make my skin crawl. At least when's I talked to. And so I've heard so many
conflicting opinions about whole life insurance. What helped me understand where you're coming from? The whole
life insurance, my problem with it is that the cash value is a fixed return, if you will. And if you're buying
$100,000 a whole life insurance, if you think about it as the cash value builds up, you're only buying the
insurance that's the difference that's in there. An alternative to whole

[28:34 - 32:08] Jack Oujo:
life insurance, which I don't have a problem with, is variable universal life insurance, whereby, and it's
basically one of the few tax loopholes that are out there. And it has to meet a certain criteria. Usually
somebody with a six figure income, they've paid down debt, they've taken care of 529s, 401k plans, and they
have this other pot of money they want to invest in. Again, outside of a brokerage account, you take a sum of
money a month, say $1,000 a month, and you go to the insurance company, and you buy the least amount of
insurance you can, so that it fits the tax definition of insurance. And you put most of the money into
investments, like mutual funds or ETFs. I don't even know if ETFs can go in them. And you build up this cash
value that you can borrow against at some point in the future. These are good things to do if you have a
litigious business, because it's protected in a bankruptcy, if you will. And I remember when Eileen and I
bought our first place down here in South Florida, we had to come up with $400,000, and she saw where I got
200,000 from, and she goes, where did I look? $200,000 come from? And I said, oh, I took a loan on the
variable universal life policy. And she goes, I forgot we even had that thing. And I go, yeah, it's for things
like that. It's for funny money. It's for a big withdrawal. It's for wedding of our kid. It's to get our hands
on something and not take the tax hit on another type of investments. And by the way, if I were to die,
there's also a tax-free life insurance benefit. That works, and I've done that with people, especially when I
knew clients were bad at saving money. And they had this, so I think variable universal life is a very good
alternative. I've done that successfully with many people. Whole life, I've sold one whole life insurance
policy in 35 years, and that's for somebody that had a medical issue, and it was the only way they were going
to get insurance. I've sold one policy. I have no problem with cash value policies as part of buy sell
agreements, non-qualified deferred compensation arrangements, and certainly with wealthy people second to die
policies, that helps pay for estate taxes. That's how Magic Johnson found out he had the AIDS virus back in
the day. But whole life insurance, the math just doesn't work on it. There's other alternatives in my view.
And they're often done, people that buy that often can't afford a 401k plan. You know what I mean? They're
putting money into whole life insurance because some salesmen told them to do it instead of putting money into
a tax deductible 401k plan, which is a stupid idea. So I was looking for a guest for this podcast, and
somebody connected me with a couple infinite bankers. And I started asking, they gave their spiel, they did
most of the talking, and I think I asked them, I said, "Well, hey, if I have 100k, that won't invest in my
business, or if I need 100k from my business, why would I put it in the whole life and then borrow against it
and experience the loss of that? Why don't I just put it straight in the business?" Yeah, if you already had
the money in the life insurance in a variable universal life insurance policy, that would be the time to take
it out and put it into your business or something along those lines, because you could do a tax free and still
maintain the policy. I would never borrow money to put it into an insurance policy. That's for sure. But
that's crazy. I think that's malpractice. I think it's borderline malpractice.

[32:08 - 32:21] Craig Andrews:
Well, when I asked them that, the second one came in, and he said, "Here, let me try it." And he did basically
the same spiel. And I said, "I just don't understand." And they huffed, and basically

[32:21 - 34:45] Jack Oujo:
said, "Well, he literally said this. Well, I say, I just wasted my time." And they were sitting there trying
to make me feel stupid for not understanding their answer. You never make a client feel, you never make a
client feel stupid. You have to make clients feel empowered. I try to be like Dr. Phil, where I want my
clients to come up with the answer. And oftentimes, I'll say that. I'll sit there and go, "I know the answer
to this question." And at some point, I'll give it to you if I'm not getting through to you. I want you to
come through. I want you to be able to tell me what the right answer is and why. That's how I know I would
have communicated with you. The other thing, at the beginning of this conversation, I was mentioning all those
freaking letters I put next to my name, the reason to do that is so that you can see the whole picture. And
you could recognize all kinds of issues, the goofy shit I was talking to you about before. I think a lot of
those bankers may come and be coming to you actually thinking they're doing the right thing. They just don't
have the knowledge where they realize there's better alternatives out there for people. And I think they might
might have been genuinely trying to help you. They just didn't have the knowledge to see the whole picture. I
have many weaknesses, but rarely does somebody say that I'm not smart enough to understand what they're
saying. When I see them, I don't trust you. One of the benefits I've had in my life is I've also coached kids.
And if I had to be able to have the ability to teach 14-year-olds what to do when there's a runner on first
base and a ball sit down the left field line, execute a double cutoff so you could throw out the potential
winning run at home plate, which we're able to do the year we won the state championship. And I had to do that
with children. So now you have to have the ability as an advisor to talk about complicated subjects in a way
that are simple for people to understand without making people feel stupid. That you have to humble yourself
and not show people how smart you are, but make them feel good about their situation in a genuine way. That's
the secret to being a good advisor in my opinion. Yeah. Something happened in my life. When I moved down to
Texas, this is when I was still in corporate America. I was moving in a competitive situation. I hired an
attorney to figure out what was legit because they ever write the non-competes. And the company that was
bringing me in, they put an

[34:45 - 35:14] Craig Andrews:
attorney, a very senior attorney on it. I remember I was on line call and he's talking to my attorney and he
says, "If I hear what you're saying correctly, you're saying that North Carolina has no severability clause.
So either the entire employment agreement is valid or none of it's valid." My attorney never said that. But my
attorney was like, "Yeah, yeah, that's exactly what I'm saying." And I just admired the genius of that
attorney for making sure my attorney came out as a hero.

[35:14 - 37:36] Jack Oujo:
Absolutely. Absolutely. And when you're a professional, every accountant or attorney wants to be a hero to
their clients. That's the number one thing that an advisor's looking for. And for the attorney to do that was
very smart of him or her. Well, let's wrap up and talk about your book. What's too smart to be an empire?
What's the inspiration of that title? When I wrote the book, again, the purpose of the book was that I think a
lot of people are interested in baseball and how does somebody be a minor league umpire, have no money and a
pregnant wife and create a multi-million dollar business that's arguably one of the most successful one in the
country. How does that work? I thought that people would find value in that story. How to start a business,
grow it, sell it. How does all that work? That is in the book. So that's why I wrote the book. The title was
always Plan B. All my files are saved as Plan B. But I wrote a chapter in there. My last year in AAA, I was in
for baseball fans, I was in the old Rosenblatt Stadium in Omaha, Nebraska, where they played the college world
series for many years. I had a game in AAA and Dick Butler, who was a supervisor of umpires for the American
League, came to the game, unbeknownst to us, and I was a home plate umpire. And when the game ended, he took
us out to dinner, didn't say a word about the game until I brought up the subject. And I said, "Mr. Butler,
I've been in the eight, I've been in the minor leagues eight years now. I like to know where I stand with you
guys. What do you think?" And he goes, "Well, Jack," he goes, "I think you call a really good ball game." He
goes, "There was only one pitch I disagreed with during the game." To be perfectly honest with you, I think
you're too smart to be an umpire. And I was dumbfounded. I didn't know where to go with that. And there was
another supervisor there, Barney Derry, who put people in the major leagues for years and then was demoted. He
looked at me like, "I don't know what to freak and tell you, Jack. I don't know what to say to you." And when
I wrote that chapter, the publisher and my editor were like, "That's the title of your book right there." And
I was afraid of offending umpires with it. And I've had five major league umpires reach out to me to tell me
how much they loved the book. Their spouses loved the book. One of them, Brian Gorman, wrote a great review
online about it that the book is aptly titled, appropriately titled. So the umpires are not insulted by it,
which makes me feel good. But that's the reason for

[37:36 - 37:49] Craig Andrews:
the title of the book, the direct answer to your question. Yeah. And at high level, what would somebody get
out of the book? What they'd get out of the book is that you can set high goals for

[37:49 - 38:11] Jack Oujo:
yourself. If you're teaching children, you could say, "Here, this guy tried to be a major league umpire and
came back close to it. A couple of breaks here and there he would have achieved it." When he didn't achieve
it, he fell back on his education and a lot of education and was still able to have a really nice, happy life
for himself. And he showed you exactly how to do it in his book. He's a great book for college students and
anybody trying to reinvent their career.

[38:11 - 38:40] Craig Andrews:
Yeah. Yeah. Well, we were talking a little bit in the green room about when I was recovering coming out of the
hospital. You know, I set high goals. You know, there's some goals that I've never hit, but I've recovered to
a higher level than, you know, very, very few people survived the ventilator. And when I hear stories about
other ones who did, I'm like miles ahead of them, just by continually setting high goals. Absolutely. And the
goals have to be realistic. When I

[38:40 - 39:10] Jack Oujo:
set my goals in baseball, I did have an education to fall back on if it didn't work out. When I was borrowing
on credit cards to start the business, along with a partner, we had a written business plan using math where
we outlined how the numbers looked. And when people do that analysis on their own when they're setting goals,
they may find that the goal is not realistic or unattainable and they can come up with another goal, if you
will. So the goal setting's got to be realistic. And again, in too smart to be an umpire, I show people how to
do that.

[39:10 - 39:16] Craig Andrews:
I'm assuming we can get that on Amazon. That's on Amazon. I'll give a shameless plug with the

[39:16 - 40:10] Jack Oujo:
picture right there, me calling a steel play at a Los Angeles Dodgers game. But the book's on Amazon. There's
a website too smart to be an umpire.com. And also Oujo Wealth strategies, all the information is on there.
Somebody wants to get it. Excellent. And how can folks reach you if they need to reach you? If they go to Oujo
Wealth strategies, they can email me my email address is jack@ojowealth.com. I'm pretty easy to find. And I'm
at this stage in my life where I sold the business to two of our employees. I turned down private equity money
to do it because I think that's what a fiduciary does try to do the right thing. And I'm just here to help
people. I have college students reach out to me once a month that want me to help them connect the dots. I
have advisors reach out to me. So I'm between my lousy golf game and my grandchildren. I have some extra time
on my hands now.

[40:10 - 40:15] Craig Andrews:
Well, that's awesome. Jack, thanks for coming on fiduciary alchemy.

[40:15 - 40:17] Jack Oujo:
Thank you for having me, Craig. I really enjoyed it.

[40:17 - 45:16] Craig Andrews:
Thank you for tuning in to fiduciary alchemy. The coolest financial podcast you're likely to find. We go
looking for voices like the one you just heard because I want you to dodge the mistakes that I made and learn
it without the coma, without the drama, without nearly paying the man. I don't know why I lived. When so many
others die, that part's still a mystery. Now some folks ask, Craig, what is it you do? Well, I'm telling you
now that's no mystery at all. We solve hard marketing problems in crowded markets. So good folks like our
guests can rise above the noise, become visible, memorable, irresistible, and grow like never before. If
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recommendation, no solicitation. I'm saying it plain and well. [Music] Past performance ain't no promise of
what tomorrow brings. Markets turning people loose on all kinds of hopeful things. Every investment carries
risk. Prince of pork and fade away. What works for one won't fit us home. That truth is here to stay. Fade
away. Fade away. Here to stay. Yeah that's the compliance blues. Lord the compliance blues. Get your own
financial tax and legal help before you make your move. That's the compliance blues. Fire your situation's
yours alone. Your needs are not the same. Different facts and different goals can change the whole damn game.
So talk to somebody, qualify before you choose your own, because the weight of every money move is your own
load, your own load, your own load, your own load. That's the compliance blues. Lord the compliance blues. Get
your own financial tax and legal help before you make your move. That's the compliance blues. Oh,
informational only. Educational to get qualified financial tax and legal advice. That is right for you.