EP# 175 - Achieving Financial Freedom: The Byrne’s Path to Stability and Community Impact

Unlock the secrets to financial stability and peace of mind! Tune in to our latest episode of the Good Neighbor Podcast Estero, where we sit down with Joe, Brian, and Chris from Byrne Financial Freedom, a family-run financial advisory firm that has been transforming lives since 2006. Learn all about their client-centric approach, which has helped nearly 800 families achieve their financial goals through personalized planning and smart investing strategies. Joe's inspiring journey from New York to establishing his successful business in Southwest Florida is a testament to the power of trust and community support in financial advising.

Discover how starting early with investments and maintaining a disciplined approach can lead to substantial wealth accumulation, as backed by a compelling Vanguard study. We discuss the emotional benefits of professional guidance and how having an advisor can be as crucial as consulting a dentist for dental health. Plus, learn about Byrne Financial Freedom's unwavering commitment to community support, especially during tough times like the COVID-19 pandemic, and why their results-based fee structure is revolutionizing the way people perceive financial advising costs. Don't miss out on these valuable insights and the heartfelt stories that show how financial well-being can alleviate stress and enrich lives.

Byrne Financial Freedom
Joe, Brian & Chris Byrne
10012 Gulf Center Dr, Ste 4
Fort Myers FL 33913
239-310-5295
info.bff@lpl.com
WEBSITE

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, cabo, jim Schaller.

Speaker 2: 0:11

Welcome Good Neighbors to episode number 175 of the Good Neighbor Podcast Estero. Today we have Good Neighbors Joe, brian and Chris from Byrne Financial Freedom. Welcome guys. Hey there, hey Jim.

Speaker 3: 0:22

Good morning, excited to be here, jim, and share our knowledge with the great community of Southwest Florida.

Speaker 2: 0:30

And always good to learn about people that work and live down here as well too. So without further ado, let's jump right in. And why don't we share a little bit about what you do over at Byrne Financial Freedom?

Speaker 4: 0:43

Yeah, I'll take that one, Jim. So Chris Byrne here, second-generation over at Byrne Financial Freedom. Yeah, I'll take that one, jim. So Chris Byrne here, second generation advisor at Byrne Financial Freedom. Joe was the founder of our business. He started it in 2006 up in Franklin, massachusetts, the Boston area. We have 10 staff in two locations Franklin Mass and then Fort Myers, florida, which is you know why we're on this wonderful podcast here this morning. We manage about $500 million in assets and we help about 800 families and what we do is we create financial plans and we handle investments for families and businesses in the local area and across the country. And Joe founded our business on the premise of helping people and we really try and live that truth, especially as a family ourselves. We treat our clients like friends and family in this business.

Speaker 2: 1:34

And that's important nowadays because a lot of people forget about that customer service side of things. So I guess, Joe, for you, how did you get involved in this industry?

Speaker 3: 1:45

So, being raised in New York by a New York police officer, my dad taught me to work with people and care about people, and if you make money while doing that, it's a beautiful thing, but at the end of the day, the most important thing is building trust with people, and that excited me. I got my accounting and computer degree from Arizona State in the early 1980s and then I started working in the Wall Street area in New York and I realized that I like working for corporations. Fidelity Investments relocated me up as a fund manager in Boston in the early 90s. I spent a bunch of years with them and then in the late 90s I started our own business, and that's really where I got excited about doing what I'm doing working with individuals.

Speaker 3: 2:37

As you know, jim, we're located at the Florida Gulf Coast Mall, right next to the UPS store. We have a business front that people walk in and sit down with us, and we're really here to help people with all kinds of financial questions. That might add, and one of our slogans is CFO for life. We like to work with people on all kinds of journeys that they might have with their financial questions.

Speaker 2: 3:02

Very nice and, speaking about journeys, we've all had some type of I want to say challenge or maybe obstacle along our journey that we can look back at now and say you know what? I'm in a better place now, but I can look back and reflect and maybe put me in a better place because of it. Is there something that happened along your journey, whether it's, you know, starting a business, growing a?

Speaker 3: 3:25

business, maintaining a business. That has happened, I would say, just caring about people and working with people. Having been the oldest of six kids and my dad telling me you want to go to college, you pay for it on your own, I had to figure out early in my life ways to save money and work a couple jobs here and there to pay my way through college. And having learned a lot of secrets along the way on how to do that, I wanted to work with our clients to educate them in the way that I became educated along my journey of life.

Speaker 2: 4:00

Very nice, very nice. So, speaking about the industry, um, there's always some type of myths or misconceptions that surround anything anybody does, but is there something in particular that we could clear up for our listeners surrounding what you guys provide?

Speaker 3: 4:18

I would say it doesn't cost a lot of money to work with financial advisors, and a lot of people think that when you work with a financial advisor you're going to pay a lot of money. Our goal is to work with our clients and work with them for life, and we get paid by the results of the money we manage for them. A lot of advisors on our field might charge hourly or a couple thousand dollars for a plan. All of that is built into our management fee that we work with our clients on their assets.

Speaker 2: 4:52

Very nice, very nice. So, speaking about the industry, are we noticing anything that's changed or that's trending in the industry recently?

Speaker 4: 5:03

Yeah, I could tackle that one. So one thing you've heard a lot about is obviously inflation over the last couple of years. So you know the Fed cut rates as a response to COVID and the money supply went up. Simply, conceptually speaking, you got more water in the pool. There's going to be more stuff splashing around, right, and that's the money supply. So you know that's been painful for people, but we think that that's slowing down here. You know inflation should start to deteriorate, but we think that that's slowing down here. You know inflation should start to deteriorate. Hopefully we don't get into an environment with deflation, because that's not good for an economy. Yes, it might be good short term to pay lower prices, but in the long run that's not healthy.

Speaker 4: 5:42

And then in our industry the biggest trend is that financial planning has taken the lead. So instead of commission trading, instead of oh, this stock is going to do so well for you. You know planning is really where advisors earn their keep and just planning a client's life out and just, you know, invest. Investing can be very simple. You don't have to take too much risk. If you start early enough, it's very easy to build wealth. And it's all statistical, it's all numbers driven right. It's not like we're doing any magic over here. Our clients are doing the hard work, they're making the money and we're just preserving that and growing that for them. That's what we do.

Speaker 2: 6:21

Very nice and there's a lot of people out there. Go ahead.

Speaker 3: 6:24

With that said, jim, I'll add that there are studies out there that shows when clients try to do it on their own and this is a Vanguard study, which is an independent firm when clients try to do it on their own, it's such an emotional battle at times and clients on average get between three to 4% a year. If they work with a professional advisor, they get between 8% and 10% a year, and that's a vanguard study. I only say that because initially people try to do it on their own, they get burnt a couple times and they realize that there are advantages in more ways than they can imagine working with professionals. It's just like I use this scenario you wouldn't try to fix your teeth on your own.

Speaker 3: 7:11

You go to a dentist when you're sick, you go to a doctor. When you have money, you should go to a professional and not think that you could do it on your own. I always remind people of that, and what we typically see in our business is the average age of a person coming into us is in their fifties, because in their 50s, because in their 50s they're starting to think about retirement and they got to get serious. We work with the next generation of our clients in their 20s, 30s and 40s to make sure their plans are set up correctly and do the right thing as they're going along.

Speaker 2: 7:46

Very nice and that's wonderful, because a lot of people don't think about it before I'm going to say it's too late, but you know, the earlier you get involved, the better it is for you in the long run. So you mentioned you're from the Northeast. What brought you down to Southwest Florida?

Speaker 3: 8:02

The excitement of the fastest growing state in the United States. Now I've actually been coming down to Florida probably for 20 years right now. My sister purchased a place in Fort Myers and every year she said why don't you come down with your three boys, brian and Chris, who you've met here? And then we have Kevin, our third, who's out in Arizona with Vanguard now, hopefully soon to be with us, but Going down to Florida for the last 20 years the excitement of there. In 2018, I rented for a year. 2019, I purchased and I've loved it ever since, and it might be because the vitamin D is always available in southwest Florida. You know I'm very active in the community, doing philanthropic work, playing tennis, getting out there, meeting with people, and I just like being outdoors all the time. You know one of my boys got a little feel for that and he's never leaving Florida and that's Chris, who's located down there all the time.

Speaker 2: 9:07

We love it down here. We love being outside. I'm from the Midwest originally and, jokingly, I blame my parents for not being born down here, but I got down here as quickly as I could. So is there one thing you wish our listeners knew about Byrne Financial Freedom that maybe they wouldn't be aware of?

Speaker 3: 9:29

Yeah, don't be afraid to come in and visit us and just say I want to sit down and talk to somebody. We will not charge for a visit. We do not charge until they commit with us. We're here to help people make the right decisions in their life financially. If that comes to budgeting to get their credit cards paid off, we'd be happy to sit down with them.

Speaker 3: 9:53

If they want to know what to do with their three or four 401ks they might have from jobs that they've jumped, we're happy to sit down with them and give recommendations.

Speaker 3: 10:03

If they're just getting started with a career, we're happy with sitting down with them and making decisions. If they have estate planning issues, if they want to figure out how to become a resident of Florida, we have attorneys we work with very closely that'll come into our office and we sit down with those clients and the attorney and make suggestions on our client's behalf that they might not realize they need to watch out for, like making sure their assets stay in the bloodline or making sure they're setting up their residency properly, or making sure they're setting up their residency properly or making sure they're not paying estate taxes when they die All these things because of the 42 years of experience that I have and the years of experience that Brian and Chris are gaining over time are so important in people's lives and, most importantly, I don't want people to feel like they're on an island on their own when we're here to help them.

Speaker 2: 10:58

Absolutely.

Speaker 3: 10:59

I'd like to add to that.

Speaker 4: 11:00

You know my dad and this is going to sound a certain way, but it's really true. My dad has taught us that helping people if you help people, the rest takes care of itself Right At the end of the day. We're just regular guys. We can have a conversation on the street or in our office. We're just regular guys. We could have a conversation on the street or in our office. We're all about trying to diagnose issues Right and help people, and personal finances are often ignored because they can be stressful.

Speaker 4: 11:24

So you just put it in the back of your mind and sometimes you think there might be a problem and there really isn't. There's no problem, You're actually good, and you live in that stress for a period of time that you didn't need to right. If you just come in, get the engine checked out right, like your car, and it's oh, everything's fine. You know actually, you're ahead of the game. You have no idea how many times we meet with clients who are twice as far ahead as they think they are and that confidence can help in your daily life. So much right, With just peace of mind and just feeling safe about your finances.

Speaker 2: 11:58

Absolutely Staying in that positive mindset per se. So how would our listeners go about contacting you if they had more questions about their finances?

Speaker 5: 12:08

Yeah, so you can call us at 239-310-5295. As Joe mentioned, you can stop by our office at Gulf Coast Town Center. We're right next to the UPS store. We have several educational events in the Southwest Florida area, typically at Miromar Lakes, and you can visit our website burnfinancialfreedom. com. That's B-Y-R-N-E financialfreedom. com.

Speaker 2: 12:35

Very good, and any last words for our listeners today.

Speaker 3: 12:39

I would say that people should feel free to reach out to us with no cost obligation, not that we're going to sell them hard.

Speaker 3: 12:52

And I'll give an example.

Speaker 3: 12:53

During the COVID time, when everything was shut down, we did a service on the beach and we had up to a hundred people come to the service on the beach and people were grateful for that because it was a really tough time in our lives with COVID. One person who came to the service had lost a child through suicide and several years later he came to me with his wife and said you know, you helped us get through a tough time. I have a financial advisor back home, but I want to shift everything to you because you didn't sell me. You were just there when I needed you and you helped us get through a tough time. And so what I would say to people is reach out to us. You may have advisors from a state that you came from, but we're local people here in Southwest Florida that's willing to talk to you. Maybe you give us a chance with some of your money and you realize things are working out good, but feel free to reach out to us, and that's the bottom line. We're here to help you guys.

Speaker 2: 13:57

And it's great you know it's this that's the bottom line. We're here to help you guys and it's great you know. This is what the podcast is all about getting to know the people in your community and connecting the people in the community with people that own local businesses here and then staying local per se, and it's nice to see you guys, as a generational family, continuing the business as well. But thank you for being such good neighbors. It's been a pleasure getting to know each one of you and I hope to see you guys out in the community soon.

Speaker 3: 14:26

Thank you, Jim, for doing this.

Speaker 1: 14:27

Thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast E Astero. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to gnpestero. com, go to GNPEstero. com. That's GNPestero. com, or call 239-296-2621.