Episode 315: The Family Meeting That Changed Everything: Planning with Purpose at End of Life with Shelby Nicholl

What does it look like when financial planning meets love, courage, and intentional family leadership? Melissa Joy, CFP® sits down with Shelby Nicholl, founder of Muriel Consulting, to share the story of her father-in-law's remarkable family meeting, held just weeks before his passing. From a handout at the table to a hug at the end, this episode is a powerful reminder that clarity is one of the greatest gifts we can give the people we love.

Papa Harry didn't wait for the hard conversations to find him. When he learned his illness was terminal, he went into action. A new roof, a clean garage, and a carefully prepared Sunday evening meeting with handouts and pens. What unfolded was one of the most organized, loving, and generous acts a parent can offer their family, and a masterclass in what it looks like to lead with both heart and intention.

What You'll Learn

• Why family meetings matter and how to structure one before a crisis hits
• How one family organized passwords, daily bills, and account access in a single sitting
• What medical directives really mean and the nuanced questions families often miss
• How to talk about wealth, legacy, and inheritance in a way that feels natural and generous
• Why beneficiary designations deserve a second look, especially for DIY investors
• How to think about bringing in a financial advisor during a transition of responsibility
• What family governance can look like beyond dollars and cents
• How one family meeting set the tone for values, communication, and stewardship across generations

Connect with Shelby:

www.murielconsulting.com

https://www.linkedin.com/in/shelbynicholl/

The previous presentation by PEARL PLANNING was intended for general information purposes only.  No portion of the presentation serves as the receipt of, or as a substitute for, personalized investment advice from PEARL PLANNING or any other investment professional of your choosing. Different types of investments involve varying degrees of risk, and it should not be assumed that future performance of any specific investment or investment strategy, or any non-investment related or planning services, discussion or content, will be profitable, be suitable for your portfolio or individual situation, or prove successful. Neither PEARL PLANNING’s investment adviser registration status, nor any amount of prior experience or success, should be construed that a certain level of results or satisfaction will be achieved if PEARL PLANNING is engaged, or continues to be engaged, to provide investment advisory services. PEARL PLANNING is neither a law firm nor accounting firm, and no portion of its services should be construed as legal or accounting advice. No portion of the video content should be construed by a client or prospective client as a guarantee that he/she will experience a certain level of results if PEARL PLANNING is engaged, or continues to be engaged, to provide investment advisory services. A copy of PEARL PLANNING’s current written disclosure Brochure discussing our advisory services and fees is available upon request or at https...

Transcript

Welcome And Episode Setup

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Welcome to the Women's Money Wisdom Podcast. I'm Melissa Joy, a certified financial planner and the founder of Perl Planning. My goal is to help you streamline and organize your finances, navigate big money decisions with confidence, and be strategic in order to grow your wealth. As a woman, you work hard for your money, and I'm here to help you make the most of it. Now let's get into the show. We've got a special episode today. I love to take real-life examples of financial planning done well, and this is one of those. Our guest, Shelby Nickel, is the founder of Murial Consulting. She's got a boutique firm that works with financial advisors, a really terrific consultant. But we're going to get personal with Shelby today and talk about her experiences with a critical and really important and special family meeting. Shelby, welcome to the podcast.

SPEAKER_02 1:04

Thank you so much for having me and giving me the chance to share this experience. I'm excited.

SPEAKER_01 1:10

Well, give me a little insight. When we were just chatting as friends, you were like, oh my gosh, I have a podcast episode topic that I need to get out into the world. Um, but basically give us the lay of the land about how this family meeting came into existence.

SPEAKER_02 1:28

Sure. Yeah. So uh this family meeting was aligned with my father-in-law's passing. And once we found out that he was sick, from the time that we found out he was sick and that it was very serious, to his death was five weeks. Wow. And so it was very fast. Obviously, the family had to really adjust to that reality. And my father-in-law was incredibly brave about how he handled all of it. I mean, from the moment he found out he was sick and dying, you know, and that there was essentially nothing that we could really do, he went into action mode to make sure that things were prepared well for his family. And so at about week three, he called the family meeting. At around week one, he told us, hey, we're going to need to have a family meeting. We need to go over the finances. At about week three is when our meeting was actually held.

Who Attended And Why It Mattered

SPEAKER_01 2:24

Well, that's amazing. And I know for many people that use this episode as an impetus to take action, hopefully, you will not be in that crunch time. This is really an episode that we can utilize, of course, for emergencies, but also for, you know, just good family stewardship. And so he had the immediate insight and I guess the gift to know how to take action. Um, but describe, you know, first of all, like what family members were involved in this meeting. Um, and then we can, you know, kind of just unfold the value that it had for the family.

SPEAKER_02 3:02

Yeah. So my my mother and father-in-law had two sons. My husband is the oldest, and then his brother Paul. And at the family meeting was, you know, we left the children out of it, the grandkids.

SPEAKER_01 3:15

Um, so it was just the minor age, I think, like, or yeah, very young.

Preparation And Agenda Design

SPEAKER_02 3:20

Yeah. One is 25, and then they're 16 and 13 and seven, you know. So, um, and I guess two 13-year-olds in there. But, you know, yes, we we left the kids out. It was really just for the adults. And um, we called, he called the meeting for a Sunday, um, kind of a Sunday evening, and we had a specific meeting time um that was pre-planned. And when we walked in, you know, at this point we uh had all had a couple weeks to adjust to the fact that he was dying. And so we knew that was happening. He also by this point had already started doing things like he cleaned out the garage and sold a bunch of things. He put a new roof on their house because we live in St. Louis and we get hail damage. And so, you know, he knew his roof had hail damage and he didn't want my mother-in-law to have to deal with that afterwards. And so, you know, I think in week one, he had the roof being replaced. So he had he had started doing all of these things to get ready. And then he said, Okay, we need to have the family meeting. Let's have it on Sundays. That works for everybody. Everybody said yes. Um, all the little kids stayed home. It was just the adults. We walk in and he had prepared for it. Um, this was not something that um that he was not prepared for. And by preparation, he had a handout. So he had a handout for each of us, single-sided sheet of paper, front and back. And my mother-in-law came around and gave all of us a pen so that we could take notes, and it was a presentation.

SPEAKER_01 4:55

So he's got uh maybe had experience in the boardroom, and he goes right into like, this is gonna be an organized meeting. We're gonna get stuff done.

Passwords And Daily Bills

SPEAKER_02 5:04

Yeah, yeah. And he was, he did have a corporate career. Um, you know, he'd had a corporate career, he'd retired about 11 years earlier from that. And he really took the lead position, you know, as as many families of that generation do, on the finances, on paying bills, on anything, you know, related to computers, et cetera. My mother-in-law had had a couple of strokes about uh about eight years ago now, eight, nine years ago. And so at that point, they had, of course, gotten everything in line. They'd always been really prepared. I think they had burial plots when they were in their 40s. So they'd always had been thinking ahead and always felt like what you should do is prepare for the end of life. And that that is a positive, both for yourself. It's a responsibility you have, but also it's it's a gift to your family to be really prepared. Okay. So what type, if you're willing to share what types of topics were on the agenda? Yeah. So we we come in, we're sitting down, we start going through the agenda. And we started, in my opinion, like looking back on it and reflecting on how he organized this. We started with the easy stuff. We started with passwords, like super simple, but he made sure to tell us, like, okay, I've taken off the password of my phone. If anybody needs to get into my phone now, they can, right?

SPEAKER_01 6:26

Um, that can be really important because so many things, even like trying to get to an operator sometimes. And after somebody passes away when you're like, I just need help. And it's like really not fun. Um, after you've made several of these phone calls and have 10 more to go. Um, you know, you constantly need that phone. Oh, the same goes for, you know, caring for a parent with diminishing capacity. Um, so so thoughtful.

SPEAKER_02 6:55

Yeah. And then he had a password manager. So all of his, you know, bank accounts, you know, the cable company, the utility bills, all of that was dictated by a password manager. So he gave us, you know, the information about the password manager and how to access it. Uh, so we went through all the password stuff first. Then we turned to the daily living bills. And he basically did a very simple cash flow statement. Here's what comes in from Social Security. Here's what our monthly bills are, here's what's going to happen after I pass what social security my mother-in-law is then going to receive. So he talked through that, you know, obviously alleviated that there's any worry about money for her. Like the daily cash flow is plenty and and is fine. And then he went into um, he went into uh the medical directive. So we ended the fourth kind of topic was then really around kind of like the wealth planning topics and and what he had accumulated. But we went into medical directive was kind of the third topic. Um, in that second topic, a practical life, daily bills. He also talked about where the accounts were, where the accounts were, what they were, what everything was held in, how much was in sort of like a money market versus, you know, daily cash in the checking account, where the checkbooks were stored, where we could find these records inside of his office. So super practical and down in the daily information.

SPEAKER_01 8:22

And it's so true. Like there's there's the overarching, you know, how are these accounts going to be managed? But what you really need as you go through um transitions of responsibility like this are so many practical considerations, like, where is that bank branch? You know, if there's a safe deposit box, which is becoming fleeting, but still exists in some cases, that key is critical. You know, those types of things can be really important.

Medical Directives In Real Life

SPEAKER_02 8:49

Yeah. And so we went through all those daily, daily life bills. It also let us know which ones of those were like in his name. Um, you know, many of them were gonna need to be kind of switched over to her name, you know, et cetera. So it gave us some of that context. Then uh then we talked about medical directive. And medical directive was, I think, one of the most important conversations that we'd had. There, uh, I think anytime you're talking about medical directive and you're talking about, well, what does life support really mean? It's incredibly important to know like what does life support mean? I think I not only had my father-in-law's illness and death, that was in uh September. My aunt had a heart transplant in November of last year as well. And it was so interesting. Then knowing what I knew about medical directive stuff and then seeing her, I was like, oh my gosh, we could have even had a better conversation on medical directive. Does a feeding tube, you know, mean life support? Does giving fluids mean life support? Like these are some of the really nitty-gritty decisions that the family could be faced with that can mean different things to different people. Um, and so, you know, we had a medical directive conversation. We we understood what his wishes were. Um, he didn't really want to be kept on life support. I think he would have said yes to liquids, um, you know, and maybe some nutrition, but not to much else, you know, would have been his his his conversation there. We also talked about what happens after death. Like what were the services that he wanted us to have? Um, where was the, you know, what were we gonna do, like burial and cremation, and you know, and then and then what happens also after my mother-in-law passes. We really had all of that conversation at this time.

SPEAKER_01 10:43

That's terrific. Um, you know, for those of you listening, I think we can wrap it up later in the conversation about the critical value of family meetings like this, but also this, these practicalities are some of um things that really offer tremendous um compassionate companionship, I think, for the people that end up being caretakers and ultimately in many cases are left with decision-making powers that can be very uncomfortable if you're not confident that the person asking you to make these decisions really wants you to make these choices too. I can just think of a friend who was um, you know, the named responsible person in a medical directive who had to make decisions about um end-of-life decisions and how much it stays with you. But I'm sure that these conversations were um comforting.

Funeral Wishes And After-Death Plans

SPEAKER_02 11:37

Yeah. And I think too for us, we had, you know, he had he had two children, there's two wives, you know, he had two sons and two wives, and we all want to do what is the right thing for them, but we also all have our own emotional journey going through this too, and personal experiences that may, even in the same family, may be very different in terms of perspectives. We just felt like it put everybody on the same page, and then there wasn't going to be any disagreement between the kids about does dad want ABC thing to happen, or did dad not want ABC, right? Like this gave us an opportunity to get everybody on the same page and in the same room and hearing it all together. And, you know, we felt like it set us up, you know, for a really successful experience in that transition and his death. And it set us up that we would always be on the same page in this way and not have any consternation about, oh, I wish we'd done something differently, or any um, you know, any disagreement, any tension between what between between the parties, like we knew what he wanted.

SPEAKER_01 12:54

Really interesting and and really helpful.

unknown 12:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:58

So you did the medical directives, and then where did the conversation lead?

SPEAKER_02 13:03

And then the conversation, uh, then the conversation, the last piece that we had to cover off on was on sort of like the wealth planning aspects. And this is one where I know my father-in-law would never have had the conversation with the family when he was well. Um, it was, you know, in this in their family, the dynamic was very much like you'll find out when we die, our money is our money, your money is your money, and you'll find out stuff when you need to. Well, my father-in-law in this case knew he was dying and decided that we did need to know. And and so it was, it became this really wonderful experience where he he got to celebrate what he had built during his life, but in a way that was really comfortable for him. He wouldn't have wanted the kids to know really in advance, but I do think it made him happy to be able to share what he had built over life over his life and the moves that he had made and in the finances to create, you know, an inheritance for the family and to create a um a generational transfer.

SPEAKER_01 14:13

And so you're describing it's not just a list of accounts. He's actually giving you a narrative of yeah, I, you know, this was, you know, this was money that I use from this to fund that or things like that.

SPEAKER_02 14:27

Yeah, and it was I, you know, in his case, he was such a millionaire next door. It was really that type of mindset, and they just worked really hard and were very diligent savers, and they built a nest egg that was amazing, you know, and he got to celebrate that just a little bit.

Wealth Planning And Legacy Narrative

SPEAKER_01 14:47

Um what a gift to pass that down from generations because, you know, perhaps um his grandkids or or their kids won't um necessarily have the same struggles or humble beginnings because of generational success. And sometimes, you know, in um research shows that, you know, kind of having that legacy story can be really critical in, you know, kind of understanding the meaning of money and reducing entitlement. So um, what a gift to have received that information.

SPEAKER_02 15:24

Yeah. And then it let us celebrate what he built, you know, it gave us an opportunity to get to say thank you. And this is amazing. And look at what you did, you know, um, which was really, I think, just really it was a way to say thanks in a way that didn't catch everybody off guard, and it was lovely. And then my father-in-law, um, he was born in Belfast, Ireland, and had come here, you know, in 1975 as an immigrant. My mother-in-law had been born in the US, but her family was all from Belfast as well, and so had been back and forth. And so they are really very Belfast oriented. And my father-in-law is very Brit was very British and wasn't a big hugger, things like that. And so after he was able to share everything that he had to share with us, the practical matters and then, you know, the gifts um that he had had been able to build over the lifetime, he uh he then said, you know, I'm and kind of closed it up with a, you know, I think through this experience too, I'm gonna become more American. And, you know, and and I haven't said it enough to my sons how much I love them. And then he gave them both a hug and said, I love you, and gave us all hugs and said, I love you. And like the things that were always a little bit hard for him just growing up the way that he did. Um, we were able to have have those moments. We were able to celebrate him. We were able to get everybody on the same page and have this beautiful meeting where we knew there wasn't going to be any strife after. And we were able, you know, to say, I love you. And it was just a gorgeous experience. We were also able to take notes along the way. We were able to make suggestions along the way. Have we thought about doing it this way or that way? And, you know, it was just incredible. It was such a gift.

SPEAKER_01 17:25

Well, so um, your father-in-law passed away not long after the meeting, a couple weeks after the meeting, right? How has that conversation and family meeting impacted everyone that's still here afterward? How is the family working together today?

Family Unity And Emotional Closure

SPEAKER_02 17:47

Yeah, the family is working together really well still. I mean, I think losing your dad was really hard on my husband and his brother and on all of us. And losing Papa Harry was, you know, it's is left a big mark for all of us. I think what we have realized through this is that Papa Harry's real legacy, though, is in the care for the family and in being an amazing parent. Like he prepared all of this documentation for us and prepared us as people for his end of life. It enabled us to not have to go searching through those papers. We didn't have to worry about where the bills were and which bills needed to be paid because we knew everything. Um, and it was truly like his legacy is in being a better parent than his dad was, and then in his sons being amazing parents, and he was able to say that to his sons. And then we're now starting to see it in the next generation. My 25-year-old stepson has a baby, and so we're able to see it with my grandchild and how Patrick is raising him and the practical matters, and how it's practical and loving, and doing all the things and showing up all the time. And I just feel like what Papa Harry did was really set the expectation for how we care for one another as family members.

SPEAKER_01 19:21

That's so special. And yeah, I mean, you're describing values that are enduring across generations. And so much of family governance, especially for families that are have the gift of wealth, um, whether it's um self-created or inherited, or in many cases both, um, is to have that cognitive insight to understand your shared and collective values and to be able to pass them along can help to create a legacy as well as um, you know, more successful stewardship of wealth. Um, so to hear the anecdotal example in real life where all of this is coming together to have a powerful and really positive message is just so special.

Values, Governance, And Next Generation

SPEAKER_02 20:12

Yeah, it's been such a special experience to be part of it. Um, my husband and I are a blended family, and I haven't been a member of the family. I mean, it's been eight, nine years, something like that. So it's not like it's been a short amount of time, but I haven't, it's it's was so incredible how they one welcomed family in, but also how this family operates. This family operates with such um with boundaries and yet still also a lot of transparency. And so it was interesting to think about like the family values, right? It's definitely family and being a good parent. Like that is top of top of the list, being a good father in particular and and running that down through the the generations. We have amazing fathers in this family. And then now to be able to be part of this experience, it has it's really changing. Um, it makes me think about what are the other values that we want to land with our kids and what does that look like? How do we make sure that we all carry on Papa Harry's legacy of being an involved father and grandfather? And how do we show up in our daily life for our children? And then also, like, you know, hard work is a value in this family for sure. You know, a little bit of scrappiness and making do with what you have, and then building that into something beautiful is part of these fan this family's values. And how do we continue to carry that on? Um, but it really is around family clarity and being, it's the whole clear, what is the word? Clarity is kindness. Right. Like this was the most kind thing that someone could do at end of life. And that was to bring their family into the conversation. Sometimes we think we should leave them out. Like that's kind, but it's not. It just makes them struggle after. This was incredibly kind to get everybody on the same page and to clear up any questions that we had while we could.

SPEAKER_01 22:30

Do you think that this experience, and I love that you use the word experience because that's really what it is? And, you know, when we talk about um experiences have more impact and power than things, um, yeah, you know, what a what an example. Do you think you will conduct your family affairs when the age appropriate with your kids differently or maybe even earlier because of what you learned from this experience?

SPEAKER_02 22:58

Yeah, I think it's a really interesting question. And it's a hard line. I I don't know that anybody has like the right answer on it because you don't want to, you, you know, I think for us, like hard work and making it on your own and having a good career and things like that are our values and that we want our kids to have. So it's gonna be this question about how much do we give versus how much do, you know, how do we enable their success without giving them too much? That's gonna be something that that we already even struggle with, right? Just because you can buy them the item doesn't mean that you necessarily should buy them the item. And so, you know, that's a conversation that we have. I definitely we will plan for absolutely family meetings. We will plan that, you know, if there's a a case of unexpected um passing, like, you know, one of the things I think about a lot is like we haven't written the letters that we want to go in with our with our documents.

DIY Investing And Needed Support

SPEAKER_01 23:56

Yeah, I think like either a letter where, you know, addressed to individuals um or a video, you know, nowadays. Um both of those can be uh a terrific resource if there's conversations that need to remain unspoken during life or just, you know, you're not ready to share. And family meetings or, you know, family governance doesn't have to always be dollars and cents either. Like you don't have to show everybody your account statements. You can do layers of, you know, amounts of information that you share, but um, you know, just even having family meeting to talk about what are your values or to um do charitable donations together, make decisions together. There can be so much power in kind of introducing whether it's like um appropriate for the family, the way the family approaches sharing information or age-appropriate um kind of get-togethers that that are tangential to wealth um can be helpful.

SPEAKER_02 24:59

Yeah, that's such a good point. I think about too the the medical directive stuff was really impactful because I do think while you have these documents and they say certain words, there's a lot of gray area about what those words actually mean. Like, what does life-saving devices even mean? Um, does that mean a trach as an example? Um, you know, in the case of my aunt who had the heart transplant, she needed a trach. Yes, it meant that. And that was okay and fine.

SPEAKER_01 25:31

That's part of the treatment, not part of the problem, right?

SPEAKER_02 25:34

Like, yeah, yeah. So you I do think having some nuanced conversations about that could be also really useful. Um, I just think it's a way to reduce the more transparency and clarity we can have, the less friction and tension that there's going to be. And then two, I think about, you know, their their stuff was was reasonably easy. It was two cents. It was, you know, reasonably easy. Um I think the one thing that my father-in-law did not get a chance to take care of fully that he probably wishes he did, is he was a DIY investor. And so I think, you know, had he had more time, we would have found a financial advisor for my mother-in-law.

Beneficiaries And Last Adjustments

SPEAKER_01 26:20

I think, like so in so many cases, um DIY, there's a cohort of people that DIY works really well. And there's an overlapping cohort of people that like it's there's a great tremendous amount of personal pride. It's, you know, they're hobbyists, they really enjoy that too. And first of all, like hopefully you've heard over the years the our regular listeners, like that's just fine by me. The challenge I see, because I see, you know, like some outcomes later, is you know, planning for incapacity, um, setting an expectation within a family that um the passionate DIYer um that you shouldn't pay if you're not that person. Like your mother-in-law may have very different preferences about her level of engagement with the you know decisions of buying and selling relative to your father-in-law and what he preferred. Um and also, you know, just um in general, it's such a gift, and you're describing this to be organized because if you, you know, had DIY'd, but every account at every place is there and you know it, and you know, you enjoy those chores of seeing that advisor and this annuity person, et cetera. Um, that is not necessarily a gift to your kids that may be juggling family, career, and your needs because of unanticipated diminished capacity or, you know, dealing with an estate.

unknown 27:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 27:47

And the like the one change that we made at the very end was also, you know, what would happen to the IRA accounts. And, you know, because I was there and because of the work I do with financial advisors and in our industry, I I knew enough to be able to say to him, hey, I don't think it should be set up that way. Let me go confirm with my experts just to make sure that my knowledge is 100%. I was pretty right. I was pretty sure I was right. But I did at least, you know, reach out to a couple of people and confirm the understanding. But he did make a couple of shifts right at the very end about in terms of like beneficiary designations or something like that. Exactly. Yeah. Instead of the beneficiaries of the IRAs going to the trust, they went to the people. And so we were able to, you know, to make that adjustment um, you know, before before he passed. And so, you know, I do think, you know, bringing in obviously an expert is something that we just didn't have enough time for while he was still here, but it is gonna be, it is a next step. Um we haven't done that yet, but it is a next step. I think that's always another way of, you know, creating clarity and kindness as well, and taking care is making sure that the person who's gonna have the new responsibilities is has the right support around them for the level to your point of engagement that they want.

Invitations For Listeners To Act

SPEAKER_01 29:04

Yeah. And I I mean, everything you're describing is um is uh all about the value of communication. And in so many cases, you know, whether it's culturally just a stiff upper, you know, British upbringing, um, we Americans culturally talk about flashy money all the time, but we don't talk about the nuts and bolts of how things really operate. The millionaire next door is not flaunting their wealth. And so sometimes it's a mystery and um or surprise and this communication and um hopefully also, and it sounds like this was the case, you know, kind of encouragement to continue the stewardship, but with, you know, with some flexibility for how things will be administered, um, is truly a gift to those who are going to be left to, you know, um do the management that really does take time and effort. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 30:01

I I mean the whole meeting was just incredible. We just had such clarity and transparency. And, you know, my father-in-law, even over the next couple of weeks before his death, was still taking care of things. He was adjusting those beneficiary designations that we just talked about. He even paid a bill the night before he passed away. I mean, it was there's nothing that he could have wrapped up better, really. I mean, he he did everything possible to make the um the practical matters as easy on the family as we really, as he really could. And it was just an incredible gift.

SPEAKER_01 30:36

Well, if you're listening to Shelby's story and thinking, I've got conversations that I don't want to leave unsaid, and or I need to get more organized. Um, you're probably not alone. Um, for many of you though, the people that may need to hear this, maybe family members that are more reluctant, or you're just like, I hope things are good, mom or dad or aunt or uncle, but I'm just not sure. So feel free to share um, you know, this anecdotal practical conversation that's not telling anyone what to do, but I do think it's encouraging um introspection, consideration, and um, you know, uh a pragmatic approach to action. So um hopefully a few of you are inspired to initiate some discussions or have that conversation that is so important. Thank you for sharing such a personal story with us, Shelby.

SPEAKER_02 31:35

Yeah, I'm so fortunate to get to share it and uh just can't say enough about how what a wonderful man my father-in-law was and how what a gift it was that he gave us.

SPEAKER_01 31:47

Well, and let that gift keep giving with uh sharing in ways like this. So thank you for yours and your family's willingness to share.

SPEAKER_02 31:56

Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 32:08

Thank you for listening to the Women's Money Wisdom podcast. If you found value in this episode, the best way that you can support the podcast is to forward an episode to a friend or leave a review. Go to ProPlan.com and the podcast link to get all the resources and links mentioned. This presentation by Pro Planning is intended for general information purposes only. No portion of this presentation serves as the receipt of or substitute for personal investment advice from Pro Planning or any other investment professional of your choosing. Copies of Pro Planning's current rent and disclosure brochure and form CRS discussing our advisory services and fees are available upon request or on our website platform at proplan.com. The information that we share is meant to educate and inspire, not serve as personalized financial advice. Everyone's situation is unique, so be sure to consult with your own financial professional for guidance that fits your life. And just so you know, the opinions shared in this podcast are Melissa's own and those of our guests. They don't necessarily represent any organizations with which Melissa is affiliated. For more important disclosures, please go to our webpage at proplan.com.