Navigating the Transition to Independence with Paul Saad

00:00
Charlie Van Derven
Thank you for tuning in to another episode of RIA Collective. My name is Charlie Van Durban. I'm your host here at RIA Collective. Our mission is to help advisers move to an independent space with less fear, create more freedom in their lives. As such, we like to bring advice from folks who have done it before. Today I'm joined by a great guest. Paul Saad is with Calabria capital. We're going to talk about that name here in a second. What I love, paul started his financial career in the big firm wirehouse space and kind of a pioneer. Paul, even if we just go back 1415 years to that independence, that was a much more arduous journey than it is today. I want to learn all about it. Man, you had to handle a lot of things on your own versus working with a consultant that's got this stuff all figured out already. 

00:49
Charlie Van Derven
First, Paul, welcome to Aria Collective and thank you so much for being my guest today. 

00:54
Paul Saad
Thank you, Charlie. I really appreciate you reaching out and I'm excited. If I can have one bit of wisdom or nugget that I can impart to somebody else and it'll be a success and a good use of my time. To your point, I just think this is fantastic what you're doing here, because it truly was the Wild West. Back then, there were no resources. Now there's things like your podcast, which I would have loved. I would have sucked up every YouTube and every podcast you put together before I finalized my ideas. Those resources weren't there. It was just fly by the seat of your pants. 

01:28
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah, and we're going to get into that, right? Because it makes things so much easier today. While the big firms want to scare you away from it paul, I don't know about you, but I sincerely feel I've had a couple of catalyst, kind of Pivot moments that put this thought in my mind. In the fiduciary responsibility, when there's a firm who's driving incentives and quotas and things along those lines, it's really hard to be client first. It's my mission to push this industry, whatever little momentum I can give it, into an independent space because I think that's where we best serve clients. Your thoughts on that? 

02:09
Paul Saad
Definitely. Collectively, we all benefit from the shift to the only and fiduciary advice. I think to me, obviously I'm biased and this is why I'm in the space I am, but I firmly believe that the client is best served when your interests are and you'll never be completely conflict free, but it's as many conflicts as you can remove. It's better for everybody. I think it just makes it the reputation. When you read surveys of what professions have good reputations, the financial services is at the bottom. It's unfortunate because there's a lot of good people doing a lot of good things, but all you need is the high profile bad guys to ruin everything for everyone. We need to bring the confidence back. 

02:57
Charlie Van Derven
I agree. I'll tell you, in doing this I worked for the early portion of my career was all wirehouse. I worked independent broker dealer. RA has really become a bigger part of what I do day to day with this podcast and with what we do on Logan social advisors side. I have met the coolest people who have that mindset, have really carved this independent path for themselves because they're bringing a purity, let's say, to the industry. I don't want to discuss that like it's in contrast to people who are crooks. Right. When I'm interviewing guys like yourself who have taken the difficult steps to create their RAA go independent, we've interviewed some breakaway attorneys, some technology vendors. Everybody serves from a really pure place. It feels like now there's exceptions to that, but certainly the people that I'm talking with, it all comes from a very pure place. 

03:52
Paul Saad
It's funny you use that word because I use that word a lot too, the word serve. And we're providing a service. We're serving. The people we are serving are paying the bills, and they should get the service for which they're paying for. Not to pay some big bloated organization that has production quotas, that's making product that they're trying to pump out the door so they can keep this. Probably sounds like sour grapes, but they've got the marble floors and the wood paneling offices, and I don't think that's where clients money should be going. We should be going to helping them do better things with their lives and everybody's got to be compensated fairly. 

04:37
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah, but real estate on the 40th floor in downtown San Francisco near you. That's crazy. 

04:44
Paul Saad
Yeah, it's a big use of funds. 

04:46
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah, for sure. Paul, I'll tell you, we met on LinkedIn and what attracted me to your profile before we got a chance to meet each other and get acquainted in the last couple of weeks here was you actually had, let's say, three steps to independence. Two steps, three tiers, if you will. Starting at that wirehouse firm level, you an independent broker dealer for a little while before starting your RIA. There was obviously I look at that and I think, well, there was a missing ingredient in that independent broker dealer environment. Maybe more independence, but not quite the independence you were seeking. Speak to that a little bit. 

05:25
Paul Saad
I think you've encapsulated it and I'll get to what the missing ingredient was and the reason, looking back, I would change. It also goes back to what we said initially. The resources when we first started or when I was looking at this weren't available and didn't provide the confidence to make a big break because the distinction between a warehouse and a commission, which they were very heavily commission focused and production focused back then. I have no idea what the compensation I don't pay attention anymore because it's not relevant to my life to just having a fee and questioning whether or not those clients would come with you and be willing to pay the fee. You didn't know because you couldn't tell anybody before you did it. You had to have all this lined up and then jump and then try to bring your clients over. 

06:20
Paul Saad
You had to go with a big leap of faith, and it just was a little overwhelming and scary. Now with the resources from your firm the greater acceptance of RIA just the better knowledge out there has made that second step, or that intermediary step, in my mind at least, useless. Because you're quite right. It was a baby step to where I wanted to go but I was too afraid to go full on. 

06:51
Charlie Van Derven
Well, and of course, we've got to take care of ourselves and our family and everything else in the process. So it's completely understandable. Paul, I think I probably encapsulated it because I've talked to a lot of people that have made that same type of move. One of my very dear friends that I met when they were a Jones advisor, went to LPL, took a big payout, got their office set up, bought their furniture, got their signage, everything else was there about six months and went, Wait a second, this isn't what I thought I was signing up for. Paid LPL back all that money just to go to the RIA. Now, that was maybe six years ago, not 1213 years ago, like we're talking for your leap. Of course, yours was 2008 to the independent broker dealer. Am I right on that timeline? 

07:37
Paul Saad
Yeah, just about. Yeah. 

07:38
Charlie Van Derven
Awesome. 2010 or twelve or what year did you open your RIA? 

07:43
Paul Saad
Calabria officially launched in 2012. The registration came in 2011, but I had to kind AI transcription. I think the official date, if I look back at my incorporation, it was 2011. The actual launch with the state and the Federals were in May 2012, I think. 

08:08
Charlie Van Derven
Okay, awesome, man. We had a brief chat before I hit the record button about naming. We both have a story about that. So Calabria capital. Tell me first. Now, you're in San Ramon, California, which I have camped at Mount Diablo. So I've been in your backyard before. 

08:24
Paul Saad
Literally almost my backyard. 

08:26
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah. I pulled a 20 1ft trailer up that switch back. Oh, yeah, man, it was tight. 

08:31
Paul Saad
I'm a brave man. Bikers must have hated you. 

08:35
Charlie Van Derven
Probably stupid. I don't know if bravery had anything to do with it. Just I can make it. Let's go for it. You live in an awesome place, by the way. Tell me about the naming Calabria Capital. What that meant to you in 2012 when you were incorporating and then what that means to you today. 

08:58
Paul Saad
Well, back then and today, the essence. It still stands for collaborative RIA. It's a play on the two word pluto. 

09:06
Charlie Van Derven
That's all. Awesome. Awesome. 

09:08
Paul Saad
Because I viewed the firm as being partners with my clients. We're working together to achieve something that they're trying to make better. We're on their side. So we're collaborative. That was a kind of general thinking. RIA registered Investment Advisor I don't know, I read it by some people and they said, that sounds kind of Italian. It sounds kind of cool. At the time I threw in capital because everything was capital back then, right. It had this Wall Street flare through it venture capital. And I didn't think it through enough. That what I really wanted to do was I'm serving individuals and retail clients and I'm planning driven. I do investment management, but the investment management serves the plan. Capital puts that money up front and that's not really where I am today. It's more the money is the tool, but the plan is the life. 

10:14
Charlie Van Derven
So I can share something. Go on, Paul. I'll share mine when you don't. 

10:20
Paul Saad
No, I just wanted to add that if I had to go back and everything is fluid, right? That's another thing about this business, is you've got to be continuously evolving and we can talk about that if you want. There's so many changes. Even since the last 1012 years I've been involved in this. I've changed my fee structure, I've changed my marketing approach, I've changed my planning approach. I'm continuously looking to see where do we go next, what makes sense for my clients, what makes sense for the firm. It's in flux and the capital part of it, I guess it could drop, but it's been part of the brand for so long. 

11:05
Charlie Van Derven
I kind of struggle with like brand equity, if you will. The longer you are in business, the more equity you're building in your brand. 2013 is when we incorporated social advisors. 

11:18
Paul Saad
Okay? 

11:19
Charlie Van Derven
That was the front end of social media for the industry, right? The, the regulators and the firms are still trying to figure out how to archive this stuff and make sure everybody was, not being promissory in their social media posts and things along those lines. So the name meant something in 2013. Here we are, 2022, right? Nine years later. I feel like the name pigeonholes us quite a bit. They do social media for financial advisors and that's only a tiny bit true anymore. Back then it was all content marketing and were good at what were doing for the time. If I look back at the strategies we use nine years ago, of course that's evolved a lot since then. We're still into content, mostly LinkedIn, but we also do a ton of work on CRM now. 

12:07
Paul Saad
Okay. 

12:07
Charlie Van Derven
All of that gets lost when it's Logan social advisors feel like and then I bounce it off people I trust and like and they go, no, you got all this brand equity, don't give that away. Yeah. I have that internal conversation or conflict all the time. 

12:24
Paul Saad
I guess the natural alternative or what a lot of people tried to push me towards and the name just kind of rubs me the wrong way is wealth management. Collaborative wealth Management and just the connotation, especially coming from a nameless firm that had wealth management and Global Wealth Management in its name, it just evoked an imagery of white shoe Wall Street, all the things that I didn't want my firm to be. Maybe capital has an epidemic sense to it that I didn't appreciate. It didn't strike me as that wasn't my intent. It was just it seemed like the right way to cap the name off. I wanted to also avoid wealth management because the connotation there was just made me shiver. 

13:11
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah. I'm thinking collaborative planning partners or something like that. 

13:15
Paul Saad
Now, today, if I had to go back and do it yeah, that would sound much better. That would resonate more to where we are and maybe five years from now it'll be something completely different. 

13:24
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah. Right. I guess I don't know what advice we can impart upon people who are sitting at one of the wirehouses listening to this thinking about, okay, what would I name my RIA? Right. But I have vision. Right. At least where you're going to be in the short term if that means three years, because you're going to build equity from day one and tough to give that away. I don't know if you got any other advice for young advisors who might be listening. 

13:55
Paul Saad
Paul, I think you hit the nail on the head. Try to have some kind of foresight to it. Obviously with the pace of change today, it's unpredictable but something that you like, that you think really encapsulates and this goes back to the number one thing you want to do is why are you doing this? 

14:16
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah, I love that. 

14:17
Paul Saad
If you figure out why you're doing this, all these decisions, whether it's naming structure, approach, marketing, clients using a target, all seem to fall into place better now. Nothing's going to ever be perfect forever, but at least you're off to a much better start and an easier start because it'll flow. 

14:38
Charlie Van Derven
Switch gears a little bit. Paul, you've talked about the evolution of this thing. Right. It's always changing whether it's the marketing or whatever approach is. There one thing that I love that I learned when we got acquainted not too long ago. You've embraced subscription pricing at this point. 

14:57
Paul Saad
Yeah, that's kind of ironically. It's a relatively new and relatively underused platform and there's a number we can talk about at length which is not a good use of your time as to why that is. It's interesting, I started conversations with clients or prospects quite some time ago, two, three years ago, about the topic because it was starting to bubble up and I just fell in love with the idea. I thought it was a great concept and I'll tell you why in a second. A lot of people kind of agreed. When it came time to deciding how they wanted me to, how they wanted to compensate me, they chose, well, let's just do the AUM model because it's so standard. I understand it, everybody's doing it. I can compare your price to everybody else and let's just go. What I am seeing though, is younger people and do it yourselfers embracing the subscription model. 

15:59
Paul Saad
Really where it kind of resonates on those two major groups is this is one area especially as a wirehouse or an RIA with large minimums or even any AUM. If you're looking to find a client and they might have lots of money, they're your perfect client. Wealth management. They've got millions of dollars investable assets, but guess what, all that money is at Vanguard. They're happy with the money at Vanguard. They tweaking and doing kinds of things with their portfolio and they don't want to give that up, or they're just leery about giving that up. Maybe they will eventually, but right now they don't trust you enough to give you ten, 521 million, whatever your minimum is. So how do you serve those people? Because they have needs and they call around and they want tax advice, they want state planning advice, they want asset allocation advice. 

16:57
Paul Saad
These large firms have call centers and they have their local CFPs that sit in call centers. It's nothing compared to the quality that you get from a good RIA or breakaway advisor who's been well trained. You can serve those people and you can set AI transcription that they're willing to pay. That is comparable many times to AUM, but it's just they feel it translates directly to the value they want. They don't want you managing their money because they see that as not valuable to them. They want the advice. They're willing to pay for the advice. You could say, well, you're going to pay me. Pick a number, $15,000 a year one way or the other. Yeah, but I feel more comfortable this way because it's tried true and standard, but that's changing. The other group is and this is sorry, I'm kind of rambling. 

17:50
Charlie Van Derven
No, go for it, man. 

17:51
Paul Saad
I love it is a market that I serve, kind of growing market that I'm serving now, and it works really well for them is tech employees who make a lot of money, especially equity compensation. It's very complicated when it comes to stock options and RSUs and tax implications and all that fun stuff. They're willing to pay for advice, but their challenges sometimes not that they have assets they want to manage, but they have assets you can't manage. Non vested stock or stock that has to sit in an account at ETrade or some other plan holder or large 401, there are some ways to do it, but it's more difficult to build off. They're well willing to pay at least $5,000 and up, depending on how complicated the situations are for a subscription model. You could add investment assets and they're growing their investments at a rapid pace. 

18:59
Paul Saad
They love the idea. The concept is being in my mind, or at least maybe it's because that's the traction that I'm getting and it's becoming organic. When I say to these kinds of people, well, we have an AUM traditional wealth management platform, or this subscription, they're like, tell me more about the subscription. Yeah, that's what I want. 

19:19
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah. I think probably in the last three or four years you start to see more articles written about subscription model. I haven't seen a lot of people embrace it yet, but I think it's such a great alternative for certain types of people. You outlined a lot of it. We've got one advisor that works with early career positions, let's call it right residents and right after the residency where they got a hill of debt. Not a lot of AUM just yet, but it gives them an opportunity to work on a limited subscription model, build trust in that relationship, to your point. That when the timing for AUM is right, it's an easy transition. 

20:04
Paul Saad
Exactly. 

20:05
Charlie Van Derven
Instead of having to close the door on somebody's face because you don't have an option other than AUM. 

20:10
Paul Saad
What I like about it is you hit the value proposition hard. Everyone's looking for an investment manager, but that's not really what they're meeting. Once again, it goes back to the investment. Management is the tool. We're not fund managers. We're just managing this large pool of money for a group of investors. I'm managing money for an individual who's got life goals and objectives, and they want to do stuff with that money. What are you trying to do with that money? The first question people are automatically trained to ask is what kind of returns should I expect? Or how did you do last year without being facetious? I always say, is it going to matter to you? What's going to matter to you and how relevant? If I say 10%, 20%, 5%, how are you going to judge whether that's okay or not? It by what your neighbor did or what the market did? 

21:08
Paul Saad
And I think that's the wrong question. How can you help me manage that money in the best way that I'm getting the maximum return for the risk I'm willing to take and the liquidity available to feed the cash flow needs I have? Now that's a mouthful. It's a whole lot harder than I did better than the market, or I did as well as the market or just a bit under the market, but the year before I did better. That's an easy sell. And people go, okay, great. They just want to make sure they're doing their due diligence, but they're not really asking the right question. I don't know, maybe I'm just kind. 

21:45
Charlie Van Derven
Of well, no, I love where you're going with that, because you said something in our last conversation that I wrote down, and I don't know if I've got the quote right, but something along the lines. I'll paraphrase you, Paul, and correct me if I'm wrong here, because I think I got it right. This business is not about the markets. It's all about the people. Now, everybody wants to base it on the markets because media teaches us that. Everybody we talk to teaches us that. You're right, it isn't about the markets. It's about what your wealth can do for your life plan, right. For your goals and your children's goals and things along those lines. 

22:23
Paul Saad
I get Bloomberg sending me notices every ten minutes on what's going on in the market. 

22:29
Charlie Van Derven
Exactly. 

22:29
Paul Saad
When I come home from work, I turn on the TV and I see how the Dow did it went up 50 points. What does that mean? What does that mean for me? I don't know, but it sounds good. How come my portfolio didn't go up 50 points or my portfolio went up 200 points? Wow, I must be having a great day. This is perfect for me. 

22:47
Charlie Van Derven
The next day, right, so everything is hinging on what's going on that day or that minute versus that planning oversight, that planning view. I agree with you. Got to get away from the market. I love a couple of things that we've talked about already. It's about the people, not the markets. I love the subscription model opportunity going back to when you started the RIA and there were less resources out there at the time. 

23:13
Paul Saad
There were no resources. 

23:14
Charlie Van Derven
There were no resources. How does a guy in that position choose things like their custodian, their compliance oversight, their technology stack? I mean, it was kind of a blank slate for you. How do you approach technology? For example, Paul. 

23:35
Paul Saad
I can talk add infiniteum about technology, but just encapsulate in general to your point. I had to reach out to find RIA to do as much digging as I possibly could. I'll start with the custodian one, because that's fairly simple, because there's only a couple of really big ones if you want to be independent. There's like the hybrids you can join, which we did. A firm will be unknown, which was a hybrid, which allowed both RIA and broker dealer relationship in the same firm and where they would custody for you. Like one name you brought up and I didn't work with, but similar to LPL, so they have that hybrid model. If you want to be a pure RIA, which I would suggest, there's very few firms that will custody and that you want to have custody. I can name the names because everybody knows them and we're not talking. 

24:41
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah, go for it. 

24:42
Paul Saad
The TDs, which would now be schwab. Now there's even fewer than there was before, to be quite honest. I started with Schwab and was uncomfortable with the direction Schwab was taking back when they were building out their branches. They had all kinds of weird relationships where they would feed certain RIAs. The bigger ones, of course, sure leads, and sometimes leads to your clients, ironically. Schwab would also have their private client services. I always felt like I was competing with them, and they never interesting, I never felt loved. I looked at going to TD Ameritrade. Being Canadian, it kind of resonated with me. The name just for TD America. I know them, but they were also extremely RIA friendly. They were well known. I've been experimenting with an Upstart called Altruist. 

25:40
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah, I love that. 

25:42
Paul Saad
They're a disruptor platform, and I love that. I'm kind of cautious because to your point, custodian is something you want a little stodgy. Not too stodgy, but a little stodgy, and you want to make sure they're going to be around, that they're doing what they want to do. If I was starting Pure as an RIA, I would probably see to bring a bulk of my clients initially over to that platform. Now it's got to be people who adopt technology because they're very technology driven. I I just bought on clients that are in their sixty s. That's not to say they're not technology driven, but I gave them the option. I said, I have this Upscape firm that I really confident in, I've been working with for two years now and done my due diligence, and I liked the way they're going. They're very customer service, and we can go to TD, which they were on the retail side of TD. 

26:31
Paul Saad
We can stay at TD, which will become Schwab. And they said, we're comfortable with that. 

26:37
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah, well, I think that's helpful too. Right. Part of the reason people do business with someone at the Wirehouse is because those are big, recognizable, reputable, huge banks. Right. There's not much fear in working with those brands. Altruist, which is awesome. Everything I know or read or see about it is great, but again, it doesn't have that confidence when you say TD Ameritrade. I spent a lot of time at TD's office in Toronto, by the way, many years ago. It's not the name of TD Ameritrade or Swab. There's maybe some more confidence in those names. 

27:20
Paul Saad
I agree. One thing, it's funny that you say that, being independent, especially being like a solo firm now, and scrappy little independent. I'm kind of leery of bigger firms. Schwab was the rebel way back when I was looking to go independent. Now they've become the big stodgy old firm. I was talking to someone who was considering breaking away and they were from a firm that shall be nameless and they were like, but how do I recreate? Weren't you afraid of the brand? I said, It's got to be about you because if you're selling brand, throw up a bunch of names goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, JP. Morgan, wherever you are, there will be a bunch of clients that when you say, hey, I'm going independent, let's go. They're like, hey, you did a good job selling me on JP. Morgan. I'm really happy here. Why should I move? 

28:24
Paul Saad
If you're saying Paul's taking care of you, it's like, okay, Paul, just send me the papers and we'll switch the accounts over. I trust you. 

28:34
Charlie Van Derven
That's a great lesson right there, Paul. Those people who are using that big firm name yeah, be careful what you wish for because if you do choose to make that move, you're going to have a more difficult time moving clients based on the fact that you've sold the resources of this particular firm. 

28:51
Paul Saad
The question becomes, well, you just finished telling me two years ago how great this place was. Why are we switching? You better give me a good reason or else my trust to your fiduciary point, my trust in you is going to erode very rapidly. 

29:04
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah, that's a great point and a great lesson for those that are listening, for sure. I want to get your take on firms like Xyp Network. Orion now is more and more in the RIA space as they're developing CRM from their Red Tail acquisition and other things. Firms that kind of bring the technology stack to you. Let's talk a little bit about that. Were they kind of in a box, if you will? 

29:35
Paul Saad
Yeah, briefly. Because you brought it up before and it dovetails into this talk about technology. That to me and to many people, I think the people with the independent bend, especially as financial advisors, we tend to be very analytical and very perfect driven. We overanalyze things and the technology has exploded. Here's someone told me, paul, make sure it's good. It doesn't have to be perfect. If you're searching for perfect, it'll never be good enough and you'll just drive yourself crazy and it'll always be a shiny or new piece of technology that you're going to want to replace in your test. And it's so true. I spent so much time beta testing. I went through all the different planning tools money Guide, Pro, Emoney, Right, Capital, you name it. I've either used them for a couple of years or beta tested some of them and it's just a complete waste of time. 

30:36
Paul Saad
Well, we shouldn't say waste of time. There's some that are, if you read the Bob Verizon's of the world and you use some of these resources, who the top 34 are. You pick one that makes sense for your personal style. Also a firm that you're trying to grow goes back to the why, what type of firm and who are the clients. Build it around that instead of just trying to find I need the best management tool, I need the best CRM. Well, the best one is the one that's going to cobble all this together. You're not spending years trying to piece up everything together. XYPN, to your question, is a phenomenal resource. I'm a member and I joined, I think when they first opened like five years ago. I thought it was brilliant and it's gotten even better. It's and anyone is considering going independent, I would highly recommend really reach out to them and take a look. 

31:38
Paul Saad
They make it easy in that the tech stack is there. There's customizations. You can tweak it, but they've done the due diligence. They've put together pieces, the integration to make sure that the tools that there's, whether it be the CRM, the reporting software, any of the tools that they recommend, that they work well together, they play well together, and they're integrated, and, they're vetted by somebody. You don't have to spend hours and days and days and sometimes weeks just kind of playing with it. Because as probably just as retail clients when a new phone comes out. When my phone got upgraded, it was a new interface and I had to spend days trying to figure out how to do the things I was doing before because it was new. If you're always going for the newest, best shiny technology rambling on wasted. 

32:32
Charlie Van Derven
Time, no, you make a really solid point, right, because technology in all segments is advancing fast enough that if you are someone who is searching for that perfection, you will always be searching for it because it is always improving. The existing technology is getting better, someone new coming into the space. If you don't rely on a relationship like XYPN, someone who's already vetted that software, now you're concerned more about the tools you're using versus the people you're serving. 

33:06
Paul Saad
One thing that I learned and probably took me way longer than it should have, but I was kind of ingrained in the mentality. I don't know if they're still driving it this way in the warehouses and the big firms, very performance driven in ways that you deal with your clients. There's annual, quarterly, however you do it. I try to do quarterly, but eventually people are too busy or don't have the time or say, no, I'm fine with yearly whatever your reporting and client annual meeting schedule is looking like. Insert that there was very graph and this investment did this and your overall portfolio did this. And here's your risk portfolio. You spent hours and their eyes glaze over and they're like, because at the end of the day, it goes back to what we talked about. This is the money. That's great. But what about me? 

34:03
Paul Saad
Am I going to be able to retire? That's great. I got 10%. The market was up 8%. That's fantastic. We did great. Paul now, what does that mean? 

34:12
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah, exactly. How does that fit into the plan? 

34:14
Paul Saad
Can I retire tomorrow. Now? Yeah, a few more years. Can I send my kids to Stanford now instead of sending them to state school? It's tedious. People just tune out like a one two page report and spend the time with so, Charlie, what's been going on with you? Tell me about you. Any questions you have about your portfolio, about how on track we are, I will address. I've got all the supporting materials, but I'm not going to ship you a 40 page document and go through page by page. 

34:55
Charlie Van Derven
Right. 

34:59
Paul Saad
Because by the time we've done that, your life is flexible. I just got a raise. I just got fired. My kid just got accepted into the college of his dreams. How am I going to pay for this? This just happened last week or is about to happen. 

35:12
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah, it's a fluid situation and the market and money is only one piece of it. Paul there's a few questions before we wrap. There's a few questions I'd like to ask everybody, because I think this gets to the meat of if we can provide some advice to that listening audience that's thinking about that move to independence, take a little fear out of it. Number one, is there anything that you look back on your move now, 1012 years ago? There anything that you look back on and you think, gosh, I should have done that a little differently? 

35:43
Paul Saad
Well, we touched on it at the beginning. I wouldn't do the two step dance. 

35:47
Charlie Van Derven
Okay. 

35:48
Paul Saad
There you go. It's so much easier now. So that's a no brainer for me. I see no reason to do that. I kind of alluded to this to figure out the why you want to go independent. 

36:05
Charlie Van Derven
I love it. Great message. 

36:07
Paul Saad
And here's why I say that. A lot of people I talk to are thinking or are under the model of I'm paying 50 basis points or I'm only keeping 80 basis points, whatever their payout grid is, and I can keep it all to myself. Well, that's a good reason, but it's not a great reason. I'll get to that why I think that. The worst reason is you're an underperformer and you're feeling production pressure because that's not going to solve anything for you. You've got a different problem. If that's why you think you're going to RIA and it's going to make your life that much better, it's not, because you're going to be on your own, and you're still going to have to bring in business because guess what? You won't have Merrill Lynch feeding you these sorry. You won't have big wirehouse feeding you these leads as easily as they might be. 

37:03
Paul Saad
Now everything is on your own, and you're going to get all the scraps. If you're not producing, what's going to change dramatically? You better have a plan on how to change that dramatically when you're going to go independent to me. And this is why I did it. I just envisioned a different approach, a different model that I felt my clients weren't getting served. I wanted to be at the helm and create. I wanted to be captain of my ship and take the ship in the direction that I felt that we could bob and weave and I could market the way I wanted, I could charge the way I wanted for the value that I wanted and not be told that I had to hit certain production models. Now, with that great independence comes the freedom to do the business exactly the way you want. It's scary because like you said, people say, well, who do I market to? 

38:02
Paul Saad
Well, who do you want to market to? Think about why you're doing this in the first place. How do I build a model out through that? Who am I going to market to? Is that a good enough market? What's my value proposition going to be? How am I going to make money? If you think all that through, it makes it so much easier when you come to pull the trigger because you've got a solid plan. 

38:31
Charlie Van Derven
Flexibility is a good thing, but it can also be a difficult thing if you don't agree ahead of it. 

38:37
Paul Saad
The biggest scary part is when you go and you commit yourself to, let's say I would recommend highly, if you're not already specializing in the market, that you use this opportunity to build a firm that specializes in a market that's got enough opportunity for you. We'll talk about opportunity in a second, but you feel you can serve confidently, that we'll see the value you bring. Like I said, the people getting paid equity comp, they see the value in the tax planning and all the other things that go around that and that you're going to be able to be comfortable with dealing with. Sometimes clients, whether they be physicians I hated working with physicians for reasons that I'll keep to myself, and this is generalization, but I did focus on them for a while and just wasn't a good click. 

39:37
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah, that's okay. 

39:40
Paul Saad
The scary part of that, if you're not already doing that, is, well, what if my neighbor or some guy meets on me at a party, says, hey, I've got a portfolio. You're a financial adviser. You seem like a good guy. Do you want to take my business, and then you end up your capacity, your resources, your time is being spent with trying to say you're afraid to say no to everything, because here comes business and I need business to fill my overhead. You got to fight that tooth and nail if you're going to be true to your specialty. It might be scary at first and harder at first, but I think it'll pay off in space. 

40:19
Charlie Van Derven
I love that you've got to have faith in where you're going, and it does take a little time. Right. You're building a brand here's. The reality of it is, there's almost 700,000 registered reps in this country that includes RIA. The more narrow you get, the less competition you run into. Also in the world of content marketing, which, if you're not doing content marketing, you're missing a huge opportunity, but with the content you share, getting very specific to the audience that you're speaking to, so you get personal in that relationship. Right. I'm a big advocate of getting narrow, too. Question number two. Go ahead. 

40:53
Paul Saad
No, I'll finish that off with not only do you get personal, but you get the reputation. 

40:58
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah. 

40:59
Paul Saad
It's easier for me, if I'm an employee at Google, to say, oh, this guy knows our stock plan. He helped me with the stock, versus my neighbor comes up to me and my neighbor runs his own business. This advisor I'm not skilled in all of the ins and outs of helping business owners finance their business, sell their business. Those are all special skills that I'm not comfortable with. Even if a big client says, I'm going to sell my business for 510, $20 million, can you help me? As difficult as it is to say no, I would probably refer them to somebody else because it's just not my. 

41:41
Charlie Van Derven
Expert wrap in full circle, it's your fiduciary responsibility to ship them to somebody else because you're not the best person for them. So, Paul, flip side of that question of what you might do differently. Flip side of that is what's one thing that you did really well, that advice that you can give our listening audience as to something you did well that has propelled you into a better future, if you will. 

42:10
Paul Saad
That'S a tough one. It's less tangible than it is personal growth. This sounds like a cop out, but really, honestly, for me, it's being true to myself. 

42:27
Charlie Van Derven
Good for you. Yeah. 

42:29
Paul Saad
I don't feel like for good or for bad and there's been a little dog lately, it's become much better, which, thank God, but for good or for bad, I've always been true to myself and said, I'm going to stick by my guns. I believe this is right. This is what I didn't want to do. And it's tough at times. Like I said, you might have a lean year and you've got someone who wants you to do something. I fired clients some big clients, really big clients, just because, one, it wasn't good for my mental health, and two, when the phone rings and the hair on your back bristles because you're looking at the name on the dial, that's not good for you. 

43:21
Charlie Van Derven
No, that's a good indicator that's the wrong relationship. 

43:24
Paul Saad
Being able to do that and then feel good about it, or at least feel at peace about it to me. 

43:33
Charlie Van Derven
Liberating yeah, I've been in that too. Right. Our clients are different, but I've been in the same situation. We got a team serving clients, right? All of a Saaden, three or four people on the team say, hey, this one person is really making it difficult on all of us. Now, in the team setting, moving on from that client, you can take a deep breath, but it's also great for internal morale, if you will, because they know, your team knows you got their packets. It's not all about the dollars and cents. At the end of the day, it's about the team we're building. 

44:04
Paul Saad
Full circle goes back to the why. Why are you doing it? 

44:07
Charlie Van Derven
For sure? 

44:08
Paul Saad
Are you just doing it to make as much money as possible? You run your business that way and you measure your success that way. Are you running it for obviously, we all want to make a good living, but to me, there's more than just making a good living involved with it. That's why you go, at least that's why I went independent, because I could have made a good living at Wireharts, but I wouldn't have been true to myself. 

44:37
Charlie Van Derven
Tell me, Paul, what does the future look like for Calabria? 

44:42
Paul Saad
Ever evolving? Seriously, generally. 

44:46
Charlie Van Derven
Are you bringing on advisors? It is a solo. Good for you. 

44:52
Paul Saad
One thing, once again, understanding the why and who you are, especially now as a solo, it's a double edged sword because you do everything and you're responsible for everything. The more employees are going on in this environment, this is a whole maybe you should talk to someone about this kind of piece. Regulatory requirements, the more people have, the more I'm responsible for, which in the past is enough of a pain in the b*** if you've ever managed people. Now, the regulatory requirements, especially in a distributed environment so if we're all working from home, it just adds layers of complexity that at this point in my life, I'm just maybe if I was getting started 20 years younger, I'd have these visions of growing a big firm. I'm late 50s now, and I don't plan on retiring, but I'd rather have larger clients, fewer clients, and just be able to run it at capacity that I'm comfortable with on my own. 

45:58
Paul Saad
To me, that's part of the why and part of being true to myself. 

46:02
Charlie Van Derven
Yeah, for sure. Creating the life you want, just like you do for your clients. 

46:05
Paul Saad
Yeah. They call it a lifestyle practice. That's the buzzword term for it now. 

46:09
Charlie Van Derven
I hear that. We are to your point, blake and I'll mess up his last name because there's B's and J's involved. Blake Jordahl with RA Compliance Technology is going to be a guest coming up here soon. Blake comes out of compliance departments at large firms, so he's going to be able to speak to the compliance side of things really well. I'm sorry, go ahead to that in. 

46:34
Paul Saad
Another club for XYPN. That's another service that I wish I had available when I launched Is. They can help you and they provide a lot of help with just filing your regulatory requirements, your documents and getting the firm registered and up and started. 

46:50
Charlie Van Derven
That's awesome. 

46:51
Paul Saad
That's a nightmare in itself. 

46:53
Charlie Van Derven
Paul, final question for you. If we've got anybody listening that your story resonates with, are you okay being a resource for them? 

47:03
Paul Saad
Absolutely, Charlie. I'm a firm believer in paying it forward. Like I said, I would have killed to have these kinds of resources available to me or someone talked to me back then. I'm more than happy to give and if I can add value, then it makes me happy. 

47:20
Charlie Van Derven
I know you're responsive on LinkedIn, that's how we met. What's the best way for people to reach out to you? 

47:26
Paul Saad
I guess LinkedIn or just send me an email, head to collaboratecapital.com there's. Contact paul, my call to actions all over the place. 

47:35
Charlie Van Derven
Very good. You got the website? 

47:38
Paul Saad
Yeah. 

47:39
Charlie Van Derven
Very cool. So Collaboriacapital. C-O-L-L-A-B-R-I-A. Capital, paul. Sod and Saad is spelled S-A-A-D. If you're looking for that, we got to spell that out because who knows. Paul, I want to thank you so much for taking time out of your day to share your wisdom with our listening audience. It's cool to talk to somebody who went through it kind of before it was turnkey right. You're feeling your way through this a lot and so you've got a different learning experience and a different learning curve than what others who are going through the same transition today. Many more resources available. So, Paul, a huge thank you for taking time out and being our guests on RIA Collective today. 

48:21
Paul Saad
Great. I loved it, Charlie, and you're doing great work. Keep it up. If I can just help one person today, then it's been a success. 

48:30
Charlie Van Derven
That's awesome. Well, we hope we can help a whole lot more. For our listeners, thank you again for tuning into this episode of RIA Collective. Now we don't have huge backing like some of those podcasts out there, so if somebody that would benefit from this type of information, please share it with them. Of course, like all the podcasters say, if you can give us a review on your favorite listening platform, that helps us reach a whole lot more people. Thanks for tuning in to Rea Collective.