The Strong MD | Episode 5

Navigating Wealth Management in Medicine with Brandon Souba

Brandon Souba specializes in concierge services for physicians in Omaha and across the country as the Assistant Vice President Healthcare Banker at Core Bank. He also has experience in the mortgage industry as a Loan Officer at US Bank, and in sales with networking organization BNI, helping businesses grow through referrals across Nebraska, South Dakota, and Wyoming. At the present, he has resided in the Omaha area for the last 35 years with his family.

Published on
January 08, 2024

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Transcript

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Hello, it’s Dr. Jamie Seeman and welcome to the Strong MD podcast. I have an incredible episode for you today. I want to welcome you our guest, Brandon Souba. He is Core Bank’s assistant vp in healthcare banking and works directly with healthcare practitioners across the country regarding their banking needs. With a successful background in sales and working as a loan officer at Core Bank, he now provides tailored banking services just for healthcare professionals. With Brandon’s leadership, Core Bank is delivering top notch banking and customer service to physicians nationwide. He’s not just a banker, he’s a strategic partner for healthcare professionals across the US. I hope you enjoy today we are talking about money. Mhm. And I’m a doctor. I went into medicine to see patients. I work very hard. But I also knew that this was a career that I’d be able to provide for my family and my children and create generational wealth. But this is not my area of expertise. And what good is it to work and not have money to enjoy?

Brandon Souba: Absolutely.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Let’s go way back. Uh, I was a medical student at one time. I’m graduating college. I actually got married right before medical school started and my husband and I had moved to Omaha. And the very first thing they do when you start medical school is they bring in this lady to talk to you about loans, uh, about medical student loans. And I had to pay for my medical education. I was extremely jealous of people whose parents were financing their medical education. But I remember sitting in this room and this woman said, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Live like a student now or live like a student later because you had to decide how much money to take out. Now, I had just gotten married and so my husband had a job. So we’re trying to figure out how much money do we even need? And I felt like a really hard thing to forecast. So I was like, well, I’m just going to take the max amount because I guess we’ll just figure out how to pay. Uh, so we joked, we said, live like a student, never. That was, maybe it was a little callous to go in thinking that way, but can we talk about, for somebody listening, know, Dr. Jamie way back when, who’s starting their medical education and you’re looking at taking out a significant amount of money. How does somebody, when they’re starting off, start to think about budgeting and loans and what they’re really getting themselves into?

Brandon Souba: And Covid introduced a very weird concept to student loans specifically. Uh, I come from a mortgage background. I’m full healthcare banking now. But we were able to not include student loans when qualifying for a mortgage, because that was just the rule. So people could still buy houses even though Covid restrictions and all of that, especially students. Now they’re going to be coming into an environment where some of their classmates maybe have not been paying on their student loans for the last three years. And I don’t know if you watch the news at all, but when they flipped that switch, people freaked out a bit. Uh, I think my favorite thing I saw on the news was they interview, we’ll call it a millennial, or them a millennial. And they said, well, I went and bought a house because they said these were going to be forgiven, and now I can’t afford both. What am I supposed to do? And coming from the mortgage side, it’s all about risk. And so the student loan, uh, I have kind of a soapbox, if you can’t tell, because it is just so convoluted on what it was when you came in, because when you came in, it was, here’s your rate, here’s your term, here’s what you’re going to be paying, and it’s going to be 27 years.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: And I, by the way, did pay my loan, and it was not 27 years, but I’m a little jealous of this loan repayment thing going on.

Brandon Souba: And then there’s that too. Uh, going back to the question, as you’re trying to navigate, what does this look like? Taking on a lot of debt? It’s a lot like, what do you do when you buy a home? You can go out and get qualified for a million dollar home, let’s say. Doesn’t mean you have to buy one, right?

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Mhm.

Brandon Souba: Because with a million dollar home comes the upkeep, the furniture, all the pieces that you have to do to it. Well, same with school. When you go to school, it’s not just books and classes are covered. You are living a life in the process too.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Right.

Brandon Souba: So I’d like what you said earlier, and I think it’s before we turn the mic on, and I’ve got a quote similar to it, but what was it? Live like a student like a student.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Now or live like a student later.

Brandon Souba: Right? And so having that mindset of take out what you need so that you have wiggle room if you need more, because if you max yourself out, you’ll use it. I mean, let’s not lie. If you get a paycheck, you save some, but you use it, right? That you live based upon how much you’re making. So I would say coming into that first introduction, of what these are going to look like, understand what classes are going to look like, what the requirements and what the cost of those are, and then of course, books and budget off of that. Well, not budget off of that, base your amount off of that, because then you can always come back and get more, but once you take it, they expect you to pay it.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Yeah. Um, and then it starts creating interest. And I think that was an interesting time. When I came into medical education, there was the older doctors that got these loans with very low interest rates and they were still paying on them like years and years and years later. And I’m sitting there thinking, oh my God, I’m going to be paying on this loan when I’m 50. And they said, well, uh, that’s because my interest rate is so low and I can invest it in other place. When I came in, the interest rates were really high and it was scary to think that this is a lot of money and we’ll talk about the phases of medicine. But I got into residency and, uh, I was making payments and the interest was accruing faster than I could even pay it. I came out of residency with a loan higher than when I started, even making payments through residency. But you said something, healthcare banking. Let’s back up for just a second. What is healthcare banking?

Brandon Souba: So, uh, as I said, I was in mortgages and uh, a friend of mine was at Core Bank, that’s where I’m at. And each bank generally tries to create a division that is focused on the healthcare. And I’ll be straightforward with you, it is because of your earning capabilities, not hospitals in the long run, doctors, yes, of course we like working with practices doctor banking, but when it comes to the risk factor, and I think this will come up again, but the default rate on a physician mortgage specifically is 0.2%. It’s not a big risk for the bank to take on and they keep them on their books. So it’s a little flexible. And like I, uh, said, we’ll talk about more when we get into the product conversation. So what core decided to do is not just take products and stamp physician in front of them, but actually create checking accounts, mortgages and loans that are tailored for doctors. And so my favorite piece that I like to say is, uh, you have to onboard with us when you get a product, uh, like a mortgage or something on those lines, but you get a concierge, which is me, uh, you get benefits to the account itself. And not, um, going to lie early on, I said, well, since I’m providing it. Can I have one? And there’s actually laws in banking that you can’t give favor to certain. So we have this created so that we can favor doctors, but, uh, we can’t just give it to everyone then. So there truly are unique products that are for physicians specifically. But when banks try to get in the game, a lot of the time they’ll just take their nicest checking account and say, well, this is our physician checking account and it’s worth your while. But for us, if you don’t have the MDD or dds, I was, uh.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Literally about to ask what qualifies first. So a medical doctor, doctor dentistry. Anybody else?

Brandon Souba: Uh, so that’s the mortgage specifically. So if you’re looking for the mortgage piece, of course you get all the banking with that. Just this year, we did open it up more on the banking side. So the checking account and loan opportunities, more to your physical therapist, psychiatrist, uh, things on those lines. Ah, for me, what I was pushing was I talk to the office quite a bit when I’m working with the doctors. And how great is it that they get to hear all these cool things that the doctor is getting, but they don’t get to benefit that at their bank too. So it’s kind of a bank at work type situation where we saw the nurses and all those practitioners, we wanted to give them the opportunity to on the banking.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Okay, okay. So you guys, if you didn’t know, doctor banking, healthcare banking, it’s out there. Is this, um, statewide, is this a thing that all over the United States. So this is something unique to our community here.

Brandon Souba: It is not unique to our community, but physician is pretty, uh, impactful in our community. We have some phenomenal programs that people do come from all over the world to participate in. Cancer is kind of what top of mind in that situation. So it’s not unique to just us as a bank, because again, good deposits, low default rate, but there are banks that do it well and there’s banks that don’t do it well. And when I onboard a lot of doctors, my initial question is, at your old bank, did you have someone that you could just call or did you have to go to an 800 number? The most common answer was, when I first joined the bank, I did have that person. They left. I had no one after that. We’ll talk about this too, as we dig in. It’s important that you have somebody that you can get a hold of right away.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Yeah. Everybody is m willing to lure you in.

Brandon Souba: Yes, exactly.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Execution is everything. Okay? So let’s go back to this poor, uh, little medical student. I do not miss these days at all. Um, but if you’re going into medical school and you’re trying to figure out how much money to take and how to live, should you be pursuing buying a house? Should you rent? Do you have any advice for somebody that’s trying to figure out how to budget in that regard, coming into this?

Brandon Souba: Um, I do believe dorms are always an opportunity. Is that correct?

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Well, I think they did have some sort of student housing, um, at the time. But I’ll be real honest, my husband and I had just got married, so we, of course, wanted to have our own house, but I think there was some sort of student housing.

Brandon Souba: So I think it depends on where you are in life, because, again, if you can afford a home, great. Now, I do love when the parents buy the home and rent it to the children because there are actually tax benefits to that. Yeah. So that’s awesome. But it’s not always the case. Uh, usually, in my experience around colleges, they’re not always the best homes, but a little lower rent home that three or four people can live in while they’re going through school. Student housing is an opportunity there. I do not think it’s a great idea to buy a home while you’re in medical school. And the main reason for that is you don’t know exactly what your path is. You know what you’re studying, you know what you want to do.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Right.

Brandon Souba: But if at any point that takes a big turn, why have this huge financial burden that you chose to take on when you might lose sleep over your student loans? Unexpected things happen in life. So as a student, I think there’s huge opportunity to take advantage of rental opportunities, because then if things go south, you can just break the lease and say goodbye. It’s not as big a commitment.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Well, it makes sense because I watch classmates leave medical school for other careers, um, get married or have a life change in the middle of medical school. Um, and then, of course, this residency thing where you have to do the match. I mean, it was, these days, they’ve made it so much better. But back when I was resident, um, we walked up on stage and you opened an envelope and it just said, I’m Dr. Jamie Seeman, and I’m going to Hawaii. And it was like in front of a room full of people. Wow. Um, and you didn’t know where you were going. It was really kind of terrifying in that regard. But same thing. Four years of medical school, you’re guaranteed, but then you might be moving. So if you bought a house, you’d be looking at selling pretty quickly. And sometimes that’s not always a good investment.

Brandon Souba: Right.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Okay, so, um, you said in healthcare banking, like checking and savings and things like this. Okay, so you get this loan money. Should these people just have a basic checking account? Should you be, uh, looking at saving any money? I mean, obviously if you’re buying the money, then there’s a cost on both sides of it.

Brandon Souba: So let’s cover that in two ways. So when you take on debt, the best thing you can do to decide if you should save or not. Because where interest rates are right now versus savings account versus how much you’re paying on. I’m going to use a home equity line of credit as an example. My wife and I had this conversation, there’s no reason for us to put money in a savings account at 4% when we have a balance on a home equity line at 7%. Well, uh, it’s like eight and a half now. Oh, no, it came down, came down just last week. So when it comes to savings, it’s a great idea and you should always pay a savings account first, even if it’s five or $10 if you can put it away and you never see it perfect. That’s true savings. But I think when people think about savings, they want to have thousands and thousands of dollars sitting for emergencies or things on those lines. Well, I’m sorry again, you’re still living your life. You don’t just go to school and sleep. So you are going to have costs that come up. Should you have a checking account? Yes. Uh, what I see most common is people bank at a bank just because their parents opened their checking account there originally.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Yeah.

Brandon Souba: When you’re getting into this field, and I said this offline too, unfortunately, it’s not until residency that you really become valuable to a bank. Unless the student loan side, of course. But that’s when people are really like, hey, come on and hang out.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Even you make people come to make the graduation.

Brandon Souba: Exactly. So going and shopping banks ahead of time gives you an opportunity to really understand. I do like what this product is versus this product over here in the checking account side. Uh, one thing that we have in ours is it’s free atms across the United States. Well, for somebody that’s here in Omaha, goes to school in Lincoln or Creighton and then stays here, maybe it’s not as big a deal that you can use atms all over, but like you said, if you get matched and you’re going somewhere else into a different state. Maybe the bank you’re with isn’t the best choice. Now. This is at the younger state, because if your parents need to send you money or things on those lines, there’s pros and cons to just staying at the family bank. Uh, I left and I ended up back because of the whole core merger. So it once was my bank and then wasn’t. But I will say the bigger banks, they do very well when they have multiple locations. Then if your child, if you’re in school and you’re not at home or in your home state, you can go somewhere and talk to someone, and I think there’s value to that. Although from what I have been told, uh, the branches are not as important as they used to be because it’s all digital.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Well, I was just about to ask, are people really using atms anymore? Everything these days is electronic. You pay with your phone and the.

Brandon Souba: Atms are just so you can get cash. And people still want to have cash depending on what you’re doing. Although it amazes me how many places are now no cash. Like Vala’s pumpkin, um, patches.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: No cash.

Brandon Souba: No cash. My daughter wanted a 50 cent thing of honey, and I had a dog.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Get out your card.

Brandon Souba: I know, I’m like, you’re paying money for me to give you money. So, uh, the early days, you can shop around. People aren’t going to be too excited until you are in that residency, but then again, you’re in residency, you’re going, it’s go time. Ah, so that’s where I think having a relationship at a bank is good. But you should definitely have a checking account, definitely have a savings account, and as dangerous as it may sound, a low minimum credit card at a young age where if you can drive, you just put your gas on it and you pay it off at the end of the year. That’s huge, because one of the biggest things that affects your credit score is length of credit. How long have you had open credit? Uh, so people that are new to the game at an older age, they have a bad credit score, not because they’re bad with money. They just don’t have history to show that they were good with money.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Yeah, that was a good piece of advice my mother gave me. Uh, even when I was in high school, she got a card where they could put my name on it, where she paid it off every month. Um, but then once I was out on my own, I did the same thing. And she was like, never put anything on this card that you can’t pay for at the end of the month and just pay it off every month. And my husband and I were able to build really good credit even early in our lives. Okay, so let’s make the fantastic transition. You’ve graduated medical school, and you’re on to residency. Yay. And you get a paycheck. Uh, let’s be real. You’re not getting paid for your worth.

Brandon Souba: No. I do know what residents get paid at that point.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Um, but it’s very exciting because you’re finally getting a paycheck. So you’re like, okay, yeah, I’ll sign up for this. Okay, so you’re transitioning to finally earning an income. Now, what do you do? It’s your first month of residency. That first paycheck is coming in. How do you start to change the financial strategy?

Brandon Souba: Are we going to dig into budget here, or is this a good time to kind of dig into the budget piece?

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Exactly.

Brandon Souba: So having the discipline of budgeting is truly an art form. Uh, I was in commission sales for seven years, and this is when I was very young. Well, I guess 21, 22. I don’t know if that’s young. It’s now. But that was the hardest thing to budget with because I would have huge paychecks and then small paychecks. And so the one nice thing is in residency is you do get a form of a salary. They’re going to tell you that you’re going to make this much a year, um, whatever the pay structure is. But you’ll know what you’re going to be making and how and when you’re going to get paid. That allows you to somewhat budget. Now, unexpected things come up again. You should live your life a little. I’m not saying spend all your money, but can’t take it with you. Right.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Yeah. Um, we did a podcast on this about just this energy bank. I mean, we work so hard in the hospitals that when you do get your eight weeks of vacation per year, you want a vacation. You want to be able to do things that take your mind off of being stuck in the hospital for 80 hours a week.

Brandon Souba: Yes. And relax. I don’t know if your blood pressure is good, but it’s pretty stressful. Stressful. And you can correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think it’s even the work necessarily. It’s just the demand. Uh, because in my experience, when, uh, I work with doctors and they have a challenge, I’ve got about three times. I can talk to them once in the morning because they’re going in sometimes on their break, which is normally about 15 minutes, and you’re trying to eat, and then at the end of the day, when you’re ready to turn off and go home. So my goal is always to have that solution by that third one. So then banking wasn’t your concern during the day, and it was taken care of at the end and the lunch, 15 break. That’s the question. Okay, I need a couple of things. Here’s what I need, and then we can get that solution there. So end residency, you’re coming in. You are going to be making a paycheck. You’re still going to want to budget it as if you’re a student, though, because, yes, it’s glorious. You’re making the money, but it is not to the level of what you are going to be. And what I have seen is residents start living that life of what their projected income is going to be, and then when it does come time to making investments, buying a home, things on those lines, they’re cash poor, where all the others that made the sacrifices and lived like the student, they’re coming in with a little bit more to work with, possibly even better credit. So that gives them the upper hand on moving forward when they get to that stage.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Okay, uh, let’s say you’re a resident who’s married. I had a spouse, and he had an income, which was fantastic because he was able to support some of our living expenses and things like that. Um, so for somebody in that situation, that’s not a single person. Uh, maybe they just have a spouse. Let’s not complicate this with children quite yet, although that’s what I did. Um, but m let’s say you have a little bit more money coming into the family than just your residency income. Um, when should you start to think about financial investments and buying a house and these types of things? Like, when do you know that it’s the right time financially?

Brandon Souba: I’ll ask you a question. When’s the best time to plant an oak tree?

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Uh, I don’t know.

Brandon Souba: When you have 40 years ago. When’s the second best time today? When it comes to investing, the sooner you can do it, the better.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Okay.

Brandon Souba: And especially because, let’s see, residency, you’re eight years, so it depends what you do.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: The minimum for residency for family practice would be three years. OBGyn is four years. General surgery is five. Neurosurgery, the brain is kind of important. It’s six. But then there’s fellowships beyond that. So some people are like, super residents, and they’re in residency for, like, 810 years if you’re a plastic surgeon.

Brandon Souba: So you’re getting into your 20s, well into your 20s, uh, you don’t want to wait until you’re 30 to start investing. And again, I think we have this mindset of investing means these big, huge dollars that are producing so much money with this high income or interest rate, and that’s not the case at all. If somebody’s putting $50 away at 16 years old and they continue to do that, plus a retirement program on top of that, you’d be amazed at what that adds up to. And then there’s vehicles that you can put it in to make even more money off of that. So as much as you can put aside on the investing is fantastic. But again, you don’t want to do so much that you can’t afford to eat or live your life and be part of your life. So when it comes to having a spouse or another form of income while you’re in residency, I think it’s fantastic for that person to go down the path of, this is my lifetime career, this is what I’m going to do forever. Making the investments in the iras, whichever vehicle. And we’ll actually talk about financial planning. Not me, but we’ll talk about what you want to look for in one. Uh, but they should be making those choices then, because again, if you’re in residency and you decide this isn’t for me, which is that number pretty low, though, once they get to that point?

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Yeah, I mean, I think there’s some people that get into a residency and they’re like, yeah, and they may jump ship to another program or something like that, but I think it’s rare once you’re that far in, to not use your skills and assets because you’ve just accumulated. I mean, I have seen that, though. The panic of somebody that goes to dental school and they’re like, I don’t want to be a dentist. How am I going to pay for all, pay for all this? So, thankfully, I think that’s rare.

Brandon Souba: Right? Again, just like the default rate you’ve put so much. And when you quit, they don’t just take your student loans away, you still got to pay those, too, on what you’ve borrowed. So I think you’re in a better advantage when you do have a spouse or someone else that is, I’m going to say, somewhat on the normal side of the world or in life, because you are so engulfed in what you need to do, which is important. You said neurosurgery. It’s not just, uh, online test. You pass. Yeah. No kidding. Mean, you have to know what you’re doing. So I think there’s a huge advantage to that. And it sounds like you had a lot of fun through your residency, and it can be done. I want to be. You’re a great example. It can be done. You can have run alive.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Let me tell you what we did back then. Flights to Las Vegas were, like, $99.

Brandon Souba: Southwest and hunt.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Southwest. So my husband and I. And you could get free hotel rooms, because we just sign up for the players card, and we would take a very limited amount of money. Like, okay, we have $200. This is our entertainment. This is what we have budgeted. And our goal was to pay for the trip by the time we came home. Now, I’ll tell you, we somehow got lucky and did it a few times. That’s awesome. But it was like adult Disney world. It was cheap. You could get free drinks, and that’s just how we did it. And we kind of laugh now. Um, but, yeah, I think there’s ways that you can do it and not spend a ton of money. But I saw people do it the other way. They’re like, hey, I’m going to Spain. I might not have this opportunity once I really get into my real job, and I have to work all the time. So I think that there’s personality, too, of how people are frugal or not frugal. So when is a good time to invest in a house? I mean, should you have, um, a certain amount of money saved if you’re a resident and you’re like, I’m definitely staying in this town. This is it right here. When’s the best time to start looking at that?

Brandon Souba: What I have seen, and, uh, ironically, it’s generally the single residents with two dogs. I know that sounds weird, but that’s what I see the most, is they’ve lived a life where they have excess funds. Right. I don’t know what they chose to do in life, but I get to see bank statements, and I’m like, wow, you’re actually sitting on a great amount of money here. Like, good for you. Or inheritance. I mean, there’s just so many things that people gain money for, and you never really know, uh, why it came, and that’s not important. So what I would see is they would go find a very reasonably priced home, which that’s getting harder and harder to do, and they would invest in that home. So their dogs had a yard to run around in. And when I tell you this is common, this is so common, I can.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Think of like five med school friends right now. Right.

Brandon Souba: So that’s what drove them to get a home. But when I pre qualified them, I would give them their max number and I would always say, here’s your max number, but here’s really where I would see financially you’d be.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: So you’re looking at their finances and you’re saying, Dr. Smith, it looks like you can probably buy a home that’s in this range. Correct. And you know that he’s not going to be eating ramen.

Brandon Souba: Correct.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: In the new house. Nope.

Brandon Souba: Top range, you might be eating ramen, you might not.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Ramen level.

Brandon Souba: Exactly. And that’s what I try to encourage, is we all want to buy the house, our first home that our parents are living in now.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Mhm.

Brandon Souba: And that’s not really how it should work best off, you buy a home you can easily afford, get the equity and use that to buy the bigger home, because then you’re putting less of your money on, it’s money that you’ve invested and earned. So when it comes to these people that are buying these homes early, if it’s a reasonable home, great move. Uh, and I work with a handful of doctors that are very heavy into the investing and real estate side. So to have a few low cost homes that you can rent out, especially if it’s on campus or things on those lines, that’s a great investment. But you have to have discipline to do those things because you buy a home and now all of a sudden you need a new ac, and that’s $600 that you didn’t have just laying around. Oh, no. $6,000 kind of ac I was talking about there, I’ve replaced mine. So now what you thought was a great idea. I stretched myself a little, but I’ll be fine. Now you’re borrowing money to cover your investment. Uh, so when, the timeline that I would say to look for is when you are comfortable with the life you have and everything changes when you get married and kids, but when you’re comfortable with that life that you have and you’ve budgeted your income, if it’s allowed, absolutely. You can invest in a home or, I don’t know, some people like cars. Just that little extra that you don’t necessarily need, you have an alternative for, but you can do it. Uh, but it’s dangerous because from resident to retirement, most of our mortgage programs, uh, a lot of the mortgage, they’re zero down. So then you’re just about to ask.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Uh, what would somebody expect? Like, how much cash are we looking at saving?

Brandon Souba: And it does depend on the bank. I will say community banks that have a focus on this, they are going to give you a better deal because they want the business. They want to have you as their, uh, client. On the other side, the bigger banks, mortgage is all about risk. The bigger the bank you are, the more regulated you are, the less risk you want to take. So, physician programs do range. Ours specifically is zero down. So you can come with no money on the table, no down payment. Um, other banks that I have seen all the way up to 20%, and you had to have less than five months of your residency before they would offer that loan to you. Where, for us, once you have your white coat, we’re ready to go. Let’s get.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: I want to say ours was, like, 3%. My husband and I bought our first home, uh, with a program that was for young doctors. Awesome. And, uh, then our subsequent home, and it’s still a little bit of a chunk of money. And then, of course, you’re buying this house and expenses that come with it. There’s a lot of things to be considered. Okay, so, um, let’s get through residency, because that’s just.

Brandon Souba: We’ve all got good memories.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Locks that out of our minds. So you graduated residency, you’re getting your big. I call it my big girl job. Um, this is an exciting year.

Brandon Souba: This is an exciting time.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Yes, exactly. Because your salary is about to exponentially increase. That’s how much. For somebody listening, that’s not a doctor or a young professional. Residents get paid. I don’t even know what it is these days because I’ve been out of residency for a while. But, I mean, do you want a rough, um. I think back when I was a resident, I think my first year residency was, like, $36,000, about 15,000 more now.

Brandon Souba: Yeah, around the 50,000 range is about residency now.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Yeah, I think it was maybe. And you do get a very small increase each year. So if you’re in a four year program, it’s a couple of $1,000 extra each year. But we got a couple of free lunches in the cafeteria. But that was, like, about it. There’s not really many other perks. Okay. But you finally have your big girl, big boy job where you’re about to get a lot more money. What is my strategy in this first year? Stepping out of residency into the big world.

Brandon Souba: Okay. Uh, I call this the winning the lottery theory, because I’ve seen it. In some senses, it has to feel like you’re winning the lottery when you go from residence income to your full time in a hospital income, because it is a big change. The reason I know this is we can base what income is going to be, uh, for the approval of a mortgage. So we will see what the letter says agreeing to. Yes, you’re in a four year agreement, and this is going to be your salary for the four years. That is the time when you want to have financial people in your favor. Uh, a lot of people feel, I make 50,000 a year. I don’t really need a bank. I don’t really need an investor. And that’s completely opposite, because no matter how much money you have, it’s how you manage it that matters. I know people that never had high paying jobs, and they have a bigger savings account than I do now because they manage their money better than now. Mind you, I have a family of four. Well, I am part of that four. So we have expenses left and right, but that’s where financial, uh, investor, planner is very important. Having a banker that you can contact. Uh, I know this sounds crazy, but one of the many things that I got to deal with today was people just signing on into their bank account, just their password not working, and they got locked out.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: What am I calling the banker for? What are the questions that I’m going to need to call the banker for?

Brandon Souba: So you get locked out, let’s say you have a very busy week ahead of you.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Okay?

Brandon Souba: You get locked out of your week every week. Great example.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Name a day.

Brandon Souba: Uh, and you can’t get into your online banking on Sunday. And, you know, come Monday, this is going to be the last thing that you are going to be thinking about. So you don’t see your online banking for a good week. Now, nobody uses check leisures anymore, so you overdraw your account. Now you’re inquiring fees on these debit card purchases that you’re running. And not a single person flagged you, told you, nor could you see it. Now, if you could text your banker and say, hey, I’m locked out, can you fix this? They text you back and say, yes, you’re unlocked. Now let me know if you need a temporary password. It’s done in 1015 20. I want to give a realistic time, maybe an hour, depending on the day it’s done, and you can move on. People don’t realize how much it can cost, uh, to not report your banking correctly because of the fees and everything. That goes with it. So that’s why I think having a banker that you can respond quickly to is good. Plus, you are doing a very specific thing in your career. Right. An obgyn. Do you want your brain to be thinking of other things when you’re really engulfed in something that’s very important to one of your patients? Uh, okay. Well, if you’re $5,000 overdrawn and you don’t know why, is that going to bother you a little bit?

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Pretty distracting. Yes.

Brandon Souba: So that’s why, uh, even with our bank, we check overdrafts every day. So anybody that is listed with me as a doctor, if they are overdrawn, I will see it. If I haven’t onboarded them, I don’t have the best knowledge. But if I onboard them, one of the questions I ask is, if your account is overdrawn, what’s the best way for me to let you know? A lot of times I like to shoot me a text message in the morning. I’ll have it done. I’ll transfer money. It’ll be fine. And some are. I have an account. You can move money from that account if you ever need to. Uh, so then I don’t have to worry about it. So that’s where I think having a banker that you can communicate with is important, because it takes all that nerve and crazy off your mind. Now, the other side is the financial planning. And legally, I think I have to say this. I am not a financial planner, nor what can I give financial advice for your money.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: But did you stay at a Holiday Inn last night?

Brandon Souba: Holiday Inn Express, thank you very much. But the challenge there is, every financial planner wants to have doctors under their belt because of the income, the earning, but they don’t know how to manage it. And your income comes a lot differently than a banker’s income.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Mhm.

Brandon Souba: So there are different financial planning institutes that specialize in healthcare. And I always feel bad saying this, because as young financial players, that’s a hard business to grow and get into. But you want to have a 510 year experienced financial planner because of how important it is for them to help you managing your money. And they’re not just putting you in the same program that they’ve put all their other clients in, because you do have more opportunity to be investing more at certain times. So it’s very good to have someone that specifically knows. Um, I have a great financial planner friend myself. His wife is a doctor. So for me, no matter how long he would be in the industry, he kind of gets it. Because he’s dealing with that income already, so that’s safe. But your average kind of turnkey box financial planner, they may not have the knowledge to really benefit you as a doctor where there are people that specialize in that.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: So would you call, how do you find these people?

Brandon Souba: I’m, uh, trying to see where my notes are on that, too. Word of mouth referrals. When you’re in residency, you are literally.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Bought to the doctor’s lounge. Yes, 100%.

Brandon Souba: And I made this joke when I came on at court. I said, I want to have two surgeons working together, and in the middle of surgery, one of them complain about banking, and the other surgeon go, well, don’t you have a Brandon? I want that. That’s how I want my name to be known in the doctor community. But on the flip side of that, they talk about that stuff all the time, because once one doctor has a bad experience, they don’t want others to have that experience, too. So word of mouth referral is one of the greatest things in your, uh, industry, because let them have the rough times, and you get the benefits of. Yeah, no, I’ve had this person for 20 years. Never done me wrong. Here’s their card. And really, that’s how I’ve grown the department quite a bit. Is that word of mouth referral interesting?

Dr. Jaime Seeman: All right, the doctor’s lounge. I’m telling you, over lunchtime, although I.

Brandon Souba: Can’T imagine the stories.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Yeah, there’s quite a few conversations happening in there. But sometimes you do hear people talking about money, but it’s also something that feel like money is something that people don’t just freely talk about a lot. You could be struggling. You could have a lot of money. I don’t know. That just seems like a card. People don’t really pull out all that often.

Brandon Souba: I’ve learned those who flaunt and talk about money are usually the worst, manage eating their money.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: They’re not the single guy with two dogs.

Brandon Souba: You got it. Yes, you got it. And actually, single female, most of those were women with their two dogs buying their homes. And I was just so excited to be part of their journey because it was like, this is so cool.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: I love it. I love it. Okay, so there’s loan options that are tailored for medical professionals. So go ask about it when you’re buying that first home. Um, especially. But let’s talk about, um, loan repayment, because now you got your big job with your big paycheck, and you’re going to buy a house. How do you strategize with the budget of paying back this loan and investing because you said it’s never, well, oak tree.

Brandon Souba: And let’s play the fun game of. So you’re paying on your student loans consistently, and you have a, uh, $500 a month payment. Government says, you know what? We’re going to defer these for gosh knows how long so you don’t have to make this payment anymore. One of the worst things you can do is take that money and start using it for another investment, unless it’s of cash investment, where you’re making money on the money. But the story that we talked about where there was somebody that had student loan frozen, they were not doctors on the news, but they had, their student loan was frozen. They bought a home because they could afford it. When the student loan was unfrozen, they could not find the money to pay back what they once were paying. So when you’re looking at scheduling and budgeting now, these loans that you’re taking on, number one, don’t overextend yourself. Just because you’re making this as a gross income does not mean that you can afford all these things we talked about, that mortgage that’s too big, right? Step down a couple steps on your home in Omaha. You can still get a phenomenal home at a very reasonable price now on the coast and all that. That’s a totally different story. I don’t even understand how you manage money in California.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Makes me think of these shows that you watch on the travel channel, and they’re like, we’re helping John and Karen find their home, and the budget’s like three. Where are these people?

Brandon Souba: Oh, it is crazy. Uh, like one bedroom, one bathroom home in California can easily be a million dollars or more.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Come to Nebraska. I know you get a compound really good here.

Brandon Souba: Amazing. So it goes into the same lines of how most people should manage their money, no matter what your profession is. But the problem is, it’s that winning lottery theory. You’re getting a big number and you love this number, and you would think, there’s no way I could spend this kind of money. But you easily can spend that kind of money very quickly. Now, will a financial advisor tell you, like, hey, you’re spending too much money. Will your banker tell you that? No, it’s not our responsibility. It’s really not our place to tell you how to use your money or spend it. If you ask, we’ll definitely give you recommendations. But that’s where if you had a budget when you started in your residency or even in school, that budget is going to evolve tremendously, but you’re still going to have the savings bucket, uh, the investing bucket, and then the fun money bucket and the food. And you’ll still have kind of that habit of putting that money in those areas so that you can afford life. Because the saddest thing I have seen is a doctor wanted to add an, uh, no, they wanted to redo their main floor, whole thing. And so they came home renovation. Home renovation. They came to me to talk about a loan, and the problem was the renovation, once done, would have put them so far out of their price range within the, um, subdivision that there’s no way they could appraise that house and get back the money that they’re putting into it. Well, when we looked at alternate ideas, everything was maxed out. I mean, I had no place where I could find money for him. So talk through. Fortunately, I wasn’t able to help. Turns around, he goes, that’s okay. I just cash out some of my life insurance and I’ll get it taken care of that way. That’s not great. That’s not a solution, uh, to that situation. But again, he had quite a bit in life. So what’s a little taken off the top? Well, you continue to do that and you’re going to end up with nothing.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Right.

Brandon Souba: So when it comes to repayment of the loans, number one, when things happen where you don’t have to pay something, keep making that payment, maybe not to.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: That smaller amount or smaller amount or.

Brandon Souba: Put in a high interest savings account so you’re not going to touch it. It’s earning money. And then if they flip that switch again, it’s sitting there, you’re ready to use it, of course, minus emergencies and all those things. Uh, so that’s one opportunity there. But then two, if you’re going to borrow more than you can afford, and it’s funny, you can’t borrow more than 50% of your income for your home. And every mortgage that I did, where we were really close to that, it was one of their paychecks went directly to their mortgage. I’m like, are you sure you want to do this?

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Uh, how are you going to eat? Yeah, exactly.

Brandon Souba: So it’s the same concept of managing money, no matter who you are. But the earlier you can get into the habit of a budget, the better. And again, coming from a commission sales background where it was almost impossible to budget when I was 23 years old, I had jealousy towards those that had a salary because you know what you’re going to bring in and you know what’s going out. If you can maintain that, that’s where you can really do well.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Are there good apps or software programs for somebody that’s like, I don’t know. I don’t know how to create a budget, or is this something that their banker can really help them with?

Brandon Souba: Uh, chat, GPT, the AI thing. I bet they can make a better budget than any of us.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Google, tell me what my budget is.

Brandon Souba: Yeah, I think the hardest part of the budget, though, is sticking to. I mean, that’s where my family. You can have the best laid plans on paper, but if you go spend your food money on the bar the night before, you’re probably not going to reach your goal by the end of that month.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Yeah. Okay, how about if you have kids? Does that change any of this conversation that we’re having?

Brandon Souba: Yeah, big time.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: How so?

Brandon Souba: Well, you have an extra expense that you can’t fully predict.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: They are very expensive.

Brandon Souba: They are very expensive. We do catholic school, and we had one daughter, uh, that was still in daycare, and that’s a hefty penny. And then the other daughter, that was her only tuition that we had to pay. So I had that mindset, and this just all happened like I had literally, kindergarten. Uh, I had the mindset of, we just got this pay raise because we’re not paying half a daycare as our tuition, and now we have all this other money. Well, Dr. Steven, I have no clue where that pay raise went because it seems like we’re still right on the, um, cusp of all of them.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: We had three kids in daycare at one point, and I kept thinking, and then we had to make a decision to hold them as six year olds for kindergarten because they were summer birthdays and it was like, one more year of daycare. Maybe I should just send her early. You wouldn’t be thinking the same thing. Yeah, that it would be a Paris.

Brandon Souba: And I guess I don’t have a great answer because I can’t figure it out. Kids are an additional expense that you’re never going to be able to. I don’t know. Uh, I’m probably wrong on this, but I don’t know how to budget with kids because we’re on the third sweater for one of my kids for their, uh, school, because they keep losing them. Yeah, I budgeted clothes. Well, now we’re buying more clothes. So do kids throw a wrench in it? Absolutely. But name one thing in life that a kid doesn’t adjust or change. So, again, the more structure you have going into it, the easier it’s going to be to say, okay, well, now we got to cut this budget a little to put it over here or cut this fund to put it over here. So you’re going to be ahead of the game. If you’re already stretched and then you put a kid on top of that, the expense alone will just continue to stretch you.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Yeah, I remember I had one child in medical school, two in residency. I have no idea how we did it, you guys. Um, but I thought the kids would be young. They wouldn’t even know how crazy our life was at that point because they’re so little. But there was a point I can’t even remember which daughter it was or how old she was. But we drove by the hospital and she goes, that’s where mommy lives. And I was like, oh, God. Um, now they don’t know any different. I run out in the middle of the night and deliver baby. Mom, did you deliver a baby last night? They know that’s what I do. Um, but it’s a hard decision when you have a family, and I’m thankful that I had a partner that had an income that could help support our family, and that’s honestly why we made the decision to have kids then. But, um, they are expensive. That is a very true statement. Um, okay, so I am in private practice. So I now own my practice with several other people. But when I was coming out, I’m looking at jobs. Do I work for an academic institution? Do I work for a hospital? Do I go into private practice? Do I start my own practice? Obviously, some of those routes are a little more financially secure because you work for them and you’re just going to take that big, fat Paycheck versus buying into a practice or starting your own practice, which could cause you to need to take more money out. You’ve been taking money out for a really long time. Uh, and I’m very happy that I went that route. I like being my own boss, but talk to me, for somebody that’s kind of coming out and job searching out of residency for this big know, do you have advice in that regard of those avenues?

Brandon Souba: To me, you could even take the whole physician piece out of it. Uh, I’m very fortunate. I traveled around Wyoming, South Dakota, and Nebraska. I worked with a bunch of business owners specifically. And one thing I’ve learned, and as an entrepreneur, I hope you don’t take this the wrong way, but as a true entrepreneur, you got to be a little off just a little bit, because you take risks that the average human would be like, oh, no, that’s a horrible idea. But those risks have reward.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Absolutely.

Brandon Souba: And entrepreneurs know that reward is much greater than this tiny little risk that I’m taking now. And everybody’s telling me I’m crazy, and all of this, well, they’re ready to do it. I think the physician world is the exact same thing. If you are not the type of person that wants to run a, uh, 1099, spend 7 hours with your CPA about every quarter. If that’s not, you go to your big hospital, let them take care of you, your insurance is covered, you get all the perks, all that fun stuff. But like you said, you like to be your own boss.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Mhm.

Brandon Souba: You like to run the show. That’s that entrepreneur piece that you probably are on a much better path to where you’re going to make more money just in the long run because you’re doing what you love, how you love to do it, so you can just take, how did you do in school for your early jobs? Was it easy to work at the grocery store and be told what to do, or were you working at the grocery store and you’re like, look, I made a pyramid of soda because I thought that’d be neat. And then you get yelled at. It’s the same concept. It’s just its own world. On, uh, the practice, private practice, I call it the big box practice, where you’re in a big hospital with all that support and what I see, and a lot of entrepreneurs are the same way. You might start at that big hospital and you’ve got the insurance and all that, but it only lasts for so long before you step out. I think that that’s a great way to get patients, though, because you’re in a setting where they probably just called the phone number or maybe referred so and so hospital and they met you. I’d tell you the truth, my dentist is, because I had a root canal, I needed to be done, and I went to 911 dental on Dodge street. So after my follow up, when it was all said and done, we finished up and he goes, hey, can I walk you out? I was like, never had a dentist walk me into my car.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: But sure, something happened, something going to happen.

Brandon Souba: When we went out, he goes, I’m looking to start my own practice. Would it be okay, can you give me your contact if I would reach out for you to be a patient? Now, he couldn’t do it inside, right? I’m sure there were laws and regulations, but to show that passion, uh, I’m still with him today. And I’ve been away from that Dodge street for a long time. So that’s where I think it’s not uncommon to go to a big hospital that has processes in place, but then you’re going to go off on your own. And I do think, and you can correct me on this, but there’s different professions in the medical world that suit you better to go off on your own versus being at a hospital. Uh, anesthesiologist, to me, is going to benefit much better in a big hospital where they’re very busy and moving around versus trying to cover enough practices to make a good paycheck for them as an independent anesthesiologist. So I think I am missing that little bit where I should be a good entrepreneur. But when I’ve gotten close to taking that big risk, I’ve always had the fear, I truly have, and I’ve never made that big jump. But if you find yourself in that position, especially in the medical world, you have somewhat of a client base. I think you should take the jump.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Yeah, I’m a huge fan of it. We’re just seeing so many shifts in healthcare of you’re not seeing many private practices anymore because the overhead is very expensive and the loans are very expensive. And so people are selling out to hospitals because they don’t want to be business people. And it is definitely not for everybody. But I’ll just make up some numbers. When you’re coming out of residency, this hospital over here is like, we’re going to give you $400,000. You’re going to come have this amazing job, and this, that and the other. But they’re going to tell you how many patients to see a day. And then the second year, they’re going to be like, yeah, you didn’t actually hit the RVU numbers that we wanted, so we’re actually going to drop your salary down to 350. These things can happen. Whereas in private practice, they may say, okay, listen, you’re only going to get 200,000. You’re going to kind of buy your way into this partnership and whatever, but then a couple of years down the road, your salary is, uh, essentially unlimited. It’s, how hard do you want to work? I mean, I work in private practice, and kind of the mantra is like, eat what you kill. So if you want to make a lot of money, you work really hard. And if you don’t want to work as hard and don’t make as much, that’s fine, too. Everybody has to find their balance, but it, uh, is scary. When you’ve accrued all of this debt, uh, and you’ve made all of these risky investments, but at the same time, I think it’s understanding, and you’ve said this, there’s a low default rate on physician loans. Uh, they have skills and assets. There is a worth to them. And people see that. Financial institutions see that. That’s why there are services that are created for physicians.

Brandon Souba: That is correct. Ah, yeah.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Uh, that’s my plug, you guys. I like the private practice world, but if you don’t want to pick out the staplers and hire and fire, and it is risky. I mean, like, the pandemic, for instance, was very risky. Being in private practice and the clinics are shut down, the hospital is limiting how much surgery you can do. That was scary for us, but I’m a huge fan of that. Um, okay, let’s talk about financial, um, strategies for balancing work and life. Okay?

Brandon Souba: So I’m going to say the blanket statement, you will never find a perfect work and life balance. I traveled and I wanted to find that, and it’s hard to do. But what I learned, and I did have someone tell me this, this is not my own, but give 100% wherever you are. And when the balance is off, at least you’re still giving credit to where credit is due. To your family, to your employees, to your clients. That, to me, is where you want to find balance. Now, if you’re never taking vacation, that’s on you. You know what I mean? It might be stressful. And some people, I’m sure, physicians especially, they feel if I leave, who is going to do all this? Actually, I probably see it more in the admin side. Well, I know how to do all the coding, so if I leave, how are you going to get the coding done? Well, great news. It’s going to get done, or it’ll be here when you get back.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: I know we don’t understand. We are replaceable.

Brandon Souba: So that mentality is what’s really going to put you in the grave early because you are meant to take breaks. I think more and more companies are pushing, we’re not going to let you roll over your vacation because we want.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: You to take, uh, it.

Brandon Souba: Yes. And I think that’s very important. So when you get into that mindset of, I have to be here, I can’t get away from this place, that’s not going to help at all. That’s not going to help at all.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Yeah, I’m an oBgyn, so I. Guilty as charged. It’s a hard, um, life in the fact that we are so attached to our patients and my husband can totally speak to this. I get a little bit of vacation anxiety because I leave town and my patients might have their baby while I’m gone and they came to see me. Um, but, uh, it’s hard. And then sometimes as a physician, you feel like when you leave the office, you almost get punished when you come back because now the inbox is full again. But you have to do it. I mean, the rate of physician burnout is real. And these probably are the percentage of people that are defaulting on their mortgages because you’ve created this amazing life. And then you’re like, this isn’t what I signed up for.

Brandon Souba: No. Nor can you enjoy the $2 million home you bought because you’re always in the office. So why not, uh, have a nice condo? I think condos are kind of funny in Omaha because, again, the cost of what you pay for a condo versus what you can get for a home is pretty off there. Uh, but to your point, if you’re not taking that time to relax, you’re actually doing a disservice to your clients, too. But all this said, I am the banker that will answer my text message anytime from a doctor because that’s what I told you I would do. But, uh, that’s coming from, I’ve created a culture in my house. Instead of me being gone from Monday to Thursday, traveling, I might sneak away for ten minutes during our family movie night or something on those lines to answer this message. That’s it. And I communicate because my wife is also in private banking, so she’ll have to do the same thing for her clients. But we communicate to each other. I’m not going to go sit on my phone for 20 minutes. I’m actually going to go take care of something really quick. Can you cover the kids? Great. And that’s how we keep our clients happy, but then we also keep a life to ourselves.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Communication. Communication. Communication.

Brandon Souba: Yeah. If we were doing a marriage podcast, that would be like, the one thing I’d be like, just communicate. Makes it a little easier.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Um, what about two physician households? Is there anything that’s super common, different to think about there?

Brandon Souba: Super common?

Dr. Jaime Seeman: I’m not married to another doctor and I like that.

Brandon Souba: Right. Um, I think it goes into kind of the military concept, too, where a lot of military people end up getting married because you are engulfed in this world that you are in and you don’t have a lot of options to get away. So I don’t know. You’re here, I’m here. Let’s make it happen. Uh, but no, a lot of my clients are married physicians. Does it change the dynamics? Not a lot. I just have to put doctor on both of them. But what I’ve noticed with that is they have usually found some type of system. Right. And especially the overnights, uh, that I’ve noticed. Or doctors that are on call a lot. The other physician generally has to have some flexibility or they have to get there. Right. Especially with kids. Especially with kids. So when it comes to the two physician household, again, how I have structured my concept and kind of my culture of their banker, I love it, because if I can’t get one, I can get the other. And they know that we’ll make this happen. Uh, but as far as being a challenge, I don’t know. I mean, you would know better in that world.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: I’m very interested that, uh, this question just came to my mind. But in two physician households, is it typically the male or the female that is running the finances?

Brandon Souba: Do you really want that?

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Yeah, I do.

Brandon Souba: Male. Yeah. Okay, it is. And I don’t know why, but then I primarily deal with the wife when it comes to the day in and day out stuff.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: But I’ll manage this. No, please.

Brandon Souba: Kind of that whole online thing. When it comes to what account is interest high, that’s usually the male. And then when it comes to moving around and getting the kids dance paid for and everything, generally, uh, yes, that is the female that I deal with on that side.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Okay. Because you work in mortgages. Uh, so much thinking about financial investment strategies for physicians. You mentioned a lot of them do real estate investments. Uh, what if you don’t have the time to be a landlord?

Brandon Souba: Uh, here’s the beauty. Uh, so there are property managers out there. And again, if you are investing into real estate because you want to have 2000 more dollars a month in pay, right, which takes a lot of houses get there. But you’re doing it for the specific purpose of, um, I want to grow my income. What I see with physicians is absolutely the income is there, but there’s also tax breaks. And as an independent contractor like yourself that owns your own business, to be able to roll some stuff over in a real estate LLC, there’s like good benefits to that. So it’s not so much that they want that money. Plus, real estate, ironically, can be a better investment than a retirement program because you can be more lucrative, you can make more off of it. So what I see is they’re using it as the investment strategy, not the Airbnb strategy.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Uh, yeah, you got it.

Brandon Souba: They’re not in there switching the laundry. They’re not pulling it for the next client to come in or anything like that. They have property managers that take those late phone calls that take care of all of that stuff. Do you pay for that? Absolutely. But again, if your ultimate goal isn’t just to make a paycheck for yourself, because these doctors are not going to quit what they’re doing. They love what they’re doing, but now they have an additional stream of income and tax breaks that they can use. So again, making your money work for you is a huge advantage. So I think real estate investing in a physician world is fantastic idea.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Fantastic idea. I’ve seen a lot of my colleagues do it, uh, but it’s not my area of expertise. I’m m a gynecologist. I deliver babies. I don’t know the first thing about that. So you really have to look for the professionals that do well, Brandon, this has been so fun.

Brandon Souba: I agree.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: I know that people are going to get so much out of this. Please tell people where they can find you if they’re local and if they want to work with you.

Brandon Souba: Yep. Awesome. I appreciate the opportunity. So, Brandon, uh, suba, I am at core bank. Uh, I am the healthcare relationship manager there. But my email is b. Souba, S-O-U-B-A with a b, as in boy on front of it@corebank.com. Uh, or my phone number is 402-321-0323 and that is the number that all doctors get. So you can text it.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: The concierge line.

Brandon Souba: Well, and my cell phone, we do have a concierge line on.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: I hope it doesn’t ring at 02:00 a.m. Like my phone does.

Brandon Souba: But it’s funny that I always preface it. I’m like, you can text and call me at two. I probably won’t answer, but I will know what your challenge is in the morning because I do have overnight doctors that I work with, and again, that’s your daytime, so I encourage them. You’re not going to wake me up. Usually now, two kids in, I sleep real well, but at least I know what it is right away. So when you go home, do your routine and go to bed, uh, when you wake up to go to your shift, I have all that time to work on stuff. So then I can give you a good answer. You can go into your shift and just have a nice day.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: I love that you can spend your time doing, uh, what you really need to do.

Brandon Souba: Absolutely.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Well, this has been great. Thank you so much. I really appreciate it.

Brandon Souba: Thank you for the opportunity, having me on.

Dr. Jaime Seeman: Thanks for listening to today’s episode. I hope you guys got a lot out of it. I don’t know about you. I’m a doctor. I do doctor work. I don’t do banking. And he gave a lot of good advice that I know we all could use. So if you guys can help us share this episode, like subscribe to the channel, we always appreciate it.