Ep96 Fred Barber - The Suburbs are Killing You (Here's How to Escape)

00;00;00;03 - 00;00;25;19
Jason Croft
Today, the show strategy plus action equals expanding your future by building your life scape. Great coaches and consultants like you have the ability to change people's lives and transform entire organizations, and your impact can often go far beyond the clients you work with. One of the reasons I love working with coaches and consultants is because of that ripple effect.

00;00;25;21 - 00;00;59;09
Jason Croft
This show is here to highlight your expertise and empower you with resources and new ideas to grow your business. Welcome to Strategy and Action. Fred Barber is on the show today, and we have this great conversation around this concept that he's put together in his book, Life Scapes, where he really brings together a lot of these concepts that so many people have talked around for several years now, combining this idea of, you know, partially a nomadic lifestyle.

00;00;59;12 - 00;01;47;02
Jason Croft
If you if you wish. but in a way that's practical and real, as well as what's possible with travel and working remotely, those things that are so much easier and again, very practical in 2024. You know, with so much of the workforce remote anyway, and besides the the possibilities out there to just do something differently, we dig into this idea that Fred really emphasizes in his book and in this interview, which is the importance of thinking about, you know, life today, especially in suburban land.

00;01;47;04 - 00;02;27;14
Jason Croft
Right. On how detrimental that is to our health by not being in these walkable areas where we just, you know, interact with our neighbors and community and move our bodies. You know, that it really is the data is there of how detrimental that is, but also what a lot of us are sitting on so many people. I mean, I think he said, you know, 10 million people across the US fit into this category of folks who have, you know, their it's the pre-retirement, but they're sitting in this house that it it's great.

00;02;27;14 - 00;03;01;01
Jason Croft
The value of their homes have has gone up, you know, over the years so much especially these last 3 or 4 years. But they're sitting in this equity that's really not doing anything. And by applying this methodology, this sort of life scapes system that that Fred has put together here in his book, you take more advantage of that equity and actually have it doing something for you while taking care of your health, while expanding your world in these different ways.

00;03;01;03 - 00;03;41;12
Jason Croft
And we do. We have those either preconceived notions or emotional attachments to maybe being in the same house or something that he really, you know, he addresses very well, in this interview. And I think you're you're really going to get a lot out of it in terms of grabbing this idea of there are many more options than just, you know, move to Florida when I retire or, you know, or I've we got to stay here another ten years or stay here because the kids may come back or there's so many more options that are actually practical.

00;03;41;12 - 00;04;05;04
Jason Croft
It's me that's just encouraging on on life in general and having that outlook, more options, more possibility. and not just the the options to do it, but have a healthier, more fulfilling life by doing them, which is all fantastic. You're gonna love this absolute blast talking with Fred. All right, let's wrap it.

00;04;05;07 - 00;04;07;27
Jason Croft
Fred Barber, welcome to the show.

00;04;07;29 - 00;04;09;19
Fred Barber
Thank you. Great to be here.

00;04;09;22 - 00;04;27;23
Jason Croft
Oh, absolutely. I'm so glad Andrew McKinney introduced us and made this connection. We had a fantastic conversation last week and, dug into your book. Thank you again for that. Already. We're going to we're going to plug from the beginning. Oh, double plug live scapes landscapes and. All right.

00;04;27;27 - 00;04;31;22
Fred Barber
And shout out to my cover designer. She did a beautiful job.

00;04;31;24 - 00;05;02;09
Jason Croft
She really did. yeah. Because I'm one of those too. Like I do judge books by their cover, without a doubt, as we all do. And it just to see that I'm like, oh thank goodness. Like this is professional. This looks great. And so right off the bat, but yeah, I really want to have you on here to, to dig into this concept that you really bring together so well in that book of having choice.

00;05;02;15 - 00;05;38;26
Jason Croft
Right in, in something as big and monumental as where we live and how we do it, you know, why are we living where we are in a way that we are in the dwelling that we're living in, right? And really expand all of that. And this is this is a topic that you people have have talked around in, in pieces from, you know, the digital nomad to, you know, doing your work on the beach idea, you know, from ten years ago that was like that.

00;05;39;01 - 00;05;53;15
Jason Croft
We're going to do that to people talk about retirement and what you can do. And then there's the concept that's been there for a long time of like, yeah, once you retire, then you just buy an RV and yeah, like the others.

00;05;53;15 - 00;05;57;10
Fred Barber
In Florida, sit around and, drive your golf cart around the neighborhood.

00;05;57;12 - 00;06;06;15
Jason Croft
Right. Or I don't know what what we'll dig into two. One of those typical ones is more, oh, I'm just gonna sit in the house that I've, you know, built this equity in.

00;06;06;22 - 00;06;11;28
Fred Barber
Age in place, right? Yeah. Because now my house is free once it's paid for, which is a myth.

00;06;12;00 - 00;06;35;19
Jason Croft
Right? Right. And that's a that's one of those that. Wow. Do you outline that so well in the book of, of which helps all of us. Right. We have these concepts of like, oh yeah, I guess that could be kind of expensive or yeah, I guess there's numbers there. But when it's all there in one on one page with these dollar amounts like, oh, so much for rent free, now that my house is paid off.

00;06;35;19 - 00;06;58;15
Fred Barber
I'm gonna jump again. Just a tiny bit on the math here. So, you know, you gotta there's there are 6 million homes in America that are worth more than $1 million today. Okay? So if you've got that paid off, you know, maybe you bought it. I mean, I I've got I know people in major metropolitan areas that bought a house for $300,000.18 years ago, right when their kids were little.

00;06;58;18 - 00;07;18;25
Fred Barber
Right. And it it was a stretch. But now the house is worth over a million. And that's that's not in the run up we've had in the last few years. That is typical. Now you get that house paid for. You don't have a paid for a house. You're paying 3 or 4% a year in property taxes, you know, plus utilities, homeowners insurance and stuff that breaks.

00;07;18;27 - 00;07;41;05
Fred Barber
So if you think about that, would you pay an investment fund manager 5% a year to manage your money? Most people would think that that's outrageous. And yet you take $1 million asset and set it out there at 5% a year. That's $50,000 a year that you're spending on investment management fees effectively. Right?

00;07;41;11 - 00;07;44;20
Jason Croft
Oh, typically isn't isn't appreciating. Well.

00;07;44;22 - 00;08;03;21
Fred Barber
Even if it is or maybe. Yeah. I mean, suppose you bought a place that's that's half that cost or a third that cost. And then took the balance and put that into a basket of ETFs that are averaging 8% a year. Doesn't take long to come out ahead. Not not to mention which the stress level it takes you down.

00;08;03;24 - 00;08;26;05
Jason Croft
Oh yeah. Oh big time. So I love this concept. I want to as we dig into this I think it's going to make sense back and forth I think a little bit on on both your your background and what got you here. But let's talk about this. What what even got you interested in this core concept of it all.

00;08;26;08 - 00;08;47;14
Fred Barber
So look, you know, most good consulting type work starts with your own experience. Right? And most consultants are, you know, a step or two ahead of their clients, right. That's how you become the world leading expert is you've done something and you're a step or two ahead of somebody else who has to do a similar thing. Right? That's what coaching is about.

00;08;47;16 - 00;09;08;00
Fred Barber
So you look, I'm at an empty nester life stage. You know, I'm a I'm a CEO of a of a tech company. My my partners buy most of my back office teams. Actually in Europe, I came in to manage this company a few years ago. and we're, we were acquired by a private equity group, but physically, my team was 100% distributed, right?

00;09;08;00 - 00;09;30;05
Fred Barber
100% remote. I could be anywhere. Nobody cares where I am, right? My clients are all over the country and in many foreign countries. So. And my kids lived in three different states. So, you know, the youngest is a senior in college here and one in law school, one married living in Chicago. And so I'm like, why am I where I am, right?

00;09;30;08 - 00;09;48;02
Fred Barber
I'm there because it's where we raised the kids. We had great schools, beautiful area. We've had tremendous run up in value in our house the last couple years, largely by luck. Luck in a pandemic. Right. So I think when everybody started working from home, they said, I'm going to have the home I want. And so all the values went up.

00;09;48;04 - 00;09;53;13
Fred Barber
Now, you know, it's tapered a little bit this year, but still you can't deny what's happened last five years, right.

00;09;53;18 - 00;09;54;09
Jason Croft
Oh yeah.

00;09;54;11 - 00;10;18;02
Fred Barber
Yeah. 17% year over year growth at home values over the last five years nationwide. So I'm I'm a quantitative social scientist when I face a problem. And by the way my wife's a CPA. So we're pretty good at the tax side of things. but I looked at this as a data analytical challenge. Right. As much as like, my own financial planner had always kind of pushed the idea, get a 15 year mortgage, pay it off.

00;10;18;03 - 00;10;51;27
Fred Barber
You know, you're living rent free, you know, but like, at a certain point, I'm over capitalized. And how do I look at this systematically? But then there's broader issues of like what makes a place healthy, right. What makes a place emotionally strong, right. What creates community? And I started reading up on those sorts of topics and I said, you know, I'm not alone in facing these decisions, but I want to lay this out from a systematic data analytical perspective.

00;10;51;29 - 00;10;58;26
Fred Barber
That's what took me down the path. And I said, well, I'll do it. Probably somebody else is interested. I should write about it.

00;10;58;28 - 00;11;35;16
Jason Croft
I love it, and this is really interesting because. You know, the fallacy is on both sides. It's on the data side in this, you know, legacy concept of just like your financial planner was advising, right. Get, you know, get that equity 15 years you have that and have that handled. And then it's gravy. Everything's perfect. And then it's there's also a fallacy on the emotional side that, you know, we build, we get this house and the kids are gone.

00;11;35;19 - 00;11;46;24
Jason Croft
But you know, every summer, every holiday, every, you know, this is going to be where the family gathers, even if they're in three different states.

00;11;46;26 - 00;11;56;13
Fred Barber
Free up the money and take the kids on a cruise for Thanksgiving. They'll like it more. Taste exactly the Christmas right?

00;11;56;15 - 00;12;25;10
Jason Croft
Right. And and honestly, like, that's what I'm excited about this conversation for and why you're coming with this concept. And in this book is because it helps us on both of those sides. Go step back and go, okay, right. I know where we've we've just been heads down data wise and emotional wise, you know, financial wise and emotional wise of like, this is the power is where we're going.

00;12;25;12 - 00;13;06;05
Jason Croft
It's time to look up and go, okay, what's the real situation here with family, with the numbers that we're dealing with and realize it's 2024 when this comes out, right. You know, and in a week it's 2024 and what's available to us now. And we're not in this place of, you know, we don't have to go all or nothing on any of it, which is I also want to dig in with you on because it's it's not like this idea of, oh, well, I have to sell everything and just, you know, live on the road or like.

00;13;06;06 - 00;13;12;27
Fred Barber
Camper van, right. Or or or go work on a beach in Bali and then sell stuff online.

00;13;12;29 - 00;13;39;22
Jason Croft
Right. And get to, you know, say in, in your computer. Yeah. It's. Yeah. And so talk to me like, so you've had that concept and as you dug into the numbers and what's possible what's started to open up for you in terms of wow, here's a scenario that makes a lot of sense. Here's a scenario in in in for these different age groups and demographics.

00;13;39;24 - 00;14;08;29
Fred Barber
Yeah. So regardless of age or demographics, I really want to focus on two real problems we have in Western society, you know, largely American society with the supplies in other countries as well. We have engineered a sedentary lifestyle where there's nowhere we can go, largely without getting in a car. If I wanted to walk to the could now that this doesn't apply to everybody, but if I wanted to walk to the closest coffee shop for my from my house, it's an hour, right?

00;14;09;01 - 00;14;13;12
Fred Barber
And you can go to it. And and I did it. So I know it's an hour. Yeah.

00;14;13;14 - 00;14;16;16
Jason Croft
And you're at a populated area. It's not like, you know, you're.

00;14;16;18 - 00;14;47;02
Fred Barber
An a suburban Dallas, but, you know, suburban America is is engineered around cars. doctor James Levine at the Mayo Clinic came up with the phrase sitting is the new smoking right? It is in many ways worse for your health than smoking. Even in things. There's even a correlation between the number of hours you sit during the day and dementia, you know, not to mention cardiovascular disease, diabetes, all these other sort of things.

00;14;47;05 - 00;15;10;02
Fred Barber
so and we see this in the macro pattern, not just like the increase in diabetes and so on, but life expectancy isn't going up in America anymore. Right? It was for decades, but it peaked about ten years ago and actually has come down in the last few years. and it is a, it's a function largely the fact that we don't move.

00;15;10;04 - 00;15;14;16
Fred Barber
Right. We we we something moves us.

00;15;14;18 - 00;15;45;18
Fred Barber
And, and then the other aspect of this. So that's kind of one epidemic in America. The other epidemic, the Surgeon General Vivek Murthy has talked about the epidemic of loneliness. Hey, we are socially isolated by the way our communities are designed. Kaiser Family Foundation did a survey. They said 22% of American adults feel socially isolated. The number of adults with five or more close friends has just continued to go down.

00;15;45;21 - 00;15;59;17
Fred Barber
I mean, you talk to anybody their 30s, 40s, 50s asking, you know, how many friends do you have? The the number is typically measured on one hand, right, of people that you really relate to on a, on a real basis, even.

00;15;59;20 - 00;16;21;29
Jason Croft
Even to maintain it takes real efforts to maintain friendships that you've had for years, much less create new ones and be in those situations you would create. It takes so much effort for someone who wants that in values that it's hard, much less just sort of like letting it happen or not.

00;16;22;02 - 00;16;43;13
Fred Barber
None of my kids, none of my extended family live in the same state we do. Okay, when I look at my college friends, my wife's college friends, they're spread all over the country that look, God bless you. If you've got your grandparents, parents, children, everybody within ten miles, right. That is a that's a gift. And there and I know people for whom that is the reality.

00;16;43;13 - 00;17;07;14
Fred Barber
But American society is highly mobile. Always has been since our founding. Right. Go west, young man. Right. We've been we've been mobile since the 1600s and and it's that is there is only increase. And so, you know if you're good to maintain and build those relationships, you can't just parachute in and see somebody for a day or two sometime or have some ski trip out west.

00;17;07;17 - 00;17;34;26
Fred Barber
You need quantity time. You need the ability to foster those relationships. But you also need that home base community to be a place that establishes connection. and so, you know, there's a though. So not only is this that, an aspect of health and emotional well-being, but it also can make a lot more financial sense. to just get out of the sedentary suburbs.

00;17;34;28 - 00;17;57;11
Jason Croft
Yeah. So what solutions did you start seeing as really as viable? You know, taking, you know, concepts like, yeah, go live and work on the beach. Okay. What's what's the realistic version of that? Or you know, what started to, to, to, you know, you what's the word. percolate.

00;17;57;14 - 00;18;14;23
Fred Barber
Yeah. With all due respect that go work on the beach idea. I think, like all of us read Tim Ferris's book in 2007. Right. Or some time after that. And he made a lot of money of East. He's built a brand off of off of, you know, the four hour workweek. But get this isn't reality, right? And there's even people who specifically criticize it.

00;18;14;24 - 00;18;42;21
Fred Barber
Even he has largely been critical of saying, hey, well, a lot of what I suggested isn't broadly applicable. but, you know, the fact that we don't need to be tied to a place, but we should be cautious or, or, systematic and where we find the place as what I call the home base. So my basic model is get a small and inexpensive of a house is makes sense, particularly for sitting out a lot of unrealized capital gain.

00;18;42;21 - 00;19;17;03
Fred Barber
You got a lot of appreciation in your house today. Get something as small and inexpensive it makes sense in a walkable urban community. Okay, now it doesn't necessarily have to be Central City, but it's a walkable community. So the the stuff you need supermarket, pizza place, brew pub, wine bar, dog groomer. All right. you know, medical facilities, walk to, make that be a normal part of your life so that getting in 10,000 steps isn't some task you have to figure out how to do.

00;19;17;06 - 00;19;38;27
Fred Barber
But it's just a natural part of how you live your life. Right? But then also make this a lock and leave so that, you know, if you want to be gone for a month or 2 or 3, there's no lawn to maintain. You know, there's no, you know, get all that exterior maintenance taken care of or even set it up as a rental.

00;19;38;29 - 00;20;05;20
Fred Barber
now, you know, what we're looking at doing is I'm not crazy about Airbnb being my primary residence. although we have set it up with a dead bolted closet, we can put, you know, heirloom type stuff in, right? but we're walking distance to a hospital in our new place, so I'm like, well, there's these travel nurses and other people that come in for, you know, 1 to 3 months rent to them when I want to be on the road someplace.

00;20;05;20 - 00;20;24;21
Fred Barber
And so we couple that with a, with a travel trailer, an RV. So, you know, we just spent a couple of weeks in Utah with our youngest daughter over Thanksgiving. Absolutely delightful. Yeah. We were at the Koa in downtown Salt Lake City, hung out with her during the day, went out hikes in the afternoon. I was still working though.

00;20;24;23 - 00;20;34;17
Fred Barber
My wife and I were both still working after the holiday. Right, I got Starlink, I got 200MB per second download speeds. I can function with that thing perfectly.

00;20;34;20 - 00;21;02;00
Jason Croft
Oh yeah. And then what a what a different experience too, of, of like, you know, maybe your daughter wouldn't have made it, you know, back to Dallas or to home or or maybe not as in, you know, it just these little experiences just to be a little bit different and think about holidays, different think about interactions and just you're in actually increasing your chance to have these great little couple of days or week interactions with with your kids inside.

00;21;02;00 - 00;21;02;17
Jason Croft
I love that.

00;21;02;23 - 00;21;29;03
Fred Barber
I call, I call it being, you know, the semi-nomadic lifestyle, right? You know, I, I do believe a home base is important. It's important for a lot of reasons, you know, not least of which is health care continuity. Right. and some aspects of community, you know, my church, some old friends, my primary physician, my dentist. You know, I want those to be in a place that that has excellence and all of those attributes.

00;21;29;05 - 00;21;32;18
Fred Barber
But I, you know, I want to be somewhere matter.

00;21;32;21 - 00;21;54;20
Jason Croft
Yeah. And that's the that again you're you're covering all the bases here, which I love because there's the practical side that you just laid out, but there's also that side. And I think it's that peace stick keeps people from going all in. And, you know, hitting the road is because for most of us, we're just wired that way.

00;21;54;20 - 00;22;11;19
Jason Croft
There is that piece of us that feels just a little untethered. If we don't have that place we call home, even if I'm barely ever there. Okay. It's there, you know, psychologically, emotionally, there's something there. And I think it's I think that is important. Like you mentioned.

00;22;11;21 - 00;22;30;28
Fred Barber
Yeah. I mean, you know, Jack Kerouac on the road, that's very, it's romantically appealing. It's not reality. And, you know, there's one person I mention in the book who, he was from Cleveland. He was a retired rock music DJ, and, you know, one other road, but he kept his kind of his home base in Cleveland.

00;22;31;01 - 00;22;53;13
Fred Barber
Well, last spring, you know, he's sort of feeling a lot of fatigue and getting winded and then had some pain in his arm. It's like, oh, I gotta go home, get this checked out. Well, turned out I needed a triple bypass surgery, right. You know, this stuff happens. But the fact that he maintained that home base had those relationships, had access to world class medicine, and the Cleveland Clinic saved his life right.

00;22;53;13 - 00;23;14;05
Fred Barber
So, you know, we need to we need to understand, like, what makes a place good. And and so, you know, again, I looked at this systematically. I compiled data, I went and I, you know, took a good chunk of the summer and built a database of 700 walkable communities in America. And that's what that's available on life scapes.

00;23;14;05 - 00;23;27;03
Fred Barber
Dot info on my website as a searchable tool. So for each one of these, I made sure to have one in every state. Wyoming was a challenge. That's it.

00;23;27;06 - 00;23;29;00
Jason Croft
is it is that walkable.

00;23;29;00 - 00;23;52;21
Fred Barber
Or you didn't go to. It's called walk, score, walk, score. Dot I think it's dot org. they, you know, they've compiled this database of, of for any address in America. They owe a zero to a higher 1 to 100 score. And, you know, my previous house was a one, the one where it was an hour to a coffee shop and I moved to one that was a 78.

00;23;52;23 - 00;24;13;07
Fred Barber
Okay. Which basically means you can do most of the things you need to do in your normal day on foot. Right? yeah. But then, you know, so that's kind of a base attribute. And then I built in things like, what's the, what's the growth rate? What's the percent? College educated, you know, what's the rankings of the schools in that area?

00;24;13;07 - 00;24;38;07
Fred Barber
There's another organization, Great Schools, compiles that data. what's the crime rate? Right. I use crime grades for that. there's an interesting source of of the natural disaster risk. The best way to get that is what's the average homeowner's insurance rate? Okay. Because if you live in an area that has tornadoes or hurricanes, you're going to pay more for homeowner's insurance.

00;24;38;09 - 00;25;07;07
Fred Barber
and it varies tremendously. Homeowner's insurance can be as low as like $400 a year to over $4,000 a year on a, you know, $300,000 type of house. the most expensive is like tornado alley, Oklahoma, Kansas, highest homeowner's insurance rates in the country because every couple of years got to replace your roof. That's right. so, you know, and then other, you know, more subjective data, like, is there a professional sports team in that county, right.

00;25;07;07 - 00;25;27;20
Fred Barber
Or a minor league team, or a major university? Is there are there arts resources? Is there a professional symphony or opera company or ballet company? so I put all that data together for 700 neighborhoods in America. and so this, took you.

00;25;27;20 - 00;25;29;14
Jason Croft
Probably just a weekend, right? Right.

00;25;29;14 - 00;25;47;20
Fred Barber
Just it was a chunk of work. It was a day, you know. So the first year I reached out to a couple of these people that are like, you know, New Urbanism influencers. And I asked him, I said, hey, yeah, you can go get this, just buy this data. And they were all like, no, it doesn't exist. You can go look up one area and get your address, you know, go find that data.

00;25;47;23 - 00;25;56;06
Fred Barber
But there's no way to search across all areas and find those that fit certain criteria. So I went and built it.

00;25;56;08 - 00;26;18;05
Jason Croft
That's awesome. Yeah, yeah. That's incredible. And that's I mean, yeah, even if they're not taking the, the, the life scapes path of all of this, what an amazing tool just to have of hey, I'm going to go, you know, I'm thinking about moving to Colorado next month. Like let me have all this in one place to to think about all of these things.

00;26;18;05 - 00;26;19;06
Jason Croft
That's amazing.

00;26;19;08 - 00;26;26;08
Fred Barber
Yeah. And by the way, where you are is going to point you to, old, old Colorado City and Manitou Springs.

00;26;26;10 - 00;26;49;00
Jason Croft
Oh, yeah. Yeah, I was reading that to buy that. That is for. Yeah, Manitou Springs especially. It's it's a perfect little town to like, be in and but still. Yeah, you're like a lot of these two. You're so close when you do want to drive and just get there to the big stuff. It's really close. But you feel like you're in this small, walkable, isolate it in a good way.

00;26;49;02 - 00;26;49;22
Jason Croft
it kind of, you know.

00;26;49;22 - 00;26;52;24
Fred Barber
Urbanism without the urban right?

00;26;52;27 - 00;26;56;05
Jason Croft
Yeah. Yeah, exactly. But yeah. So. And instead behind me.

00;26;56;10 - 00;27;24;10
Fred Barber
Right. And so, you know, I was looking at a situation where I had over $1 million of equity in a home and that's completely non practical for our stage of life. So you got to just set aside the emotional attachment that, oh, this is where my kids grew up right. And then and then we went systematically. We had a reason where we need to stay in this metro area for at least a couple more years, and largely deals with my wife's pension accrual.

00;27;24;12 - 00;27;44;10
Fred Barber
so, you know, she's two years away from full vesting. she was, you know, she works for a private school, and, Yeah. in any event, you know, we looked at that issue and we said, okay, now let's look around the metro area, let's find communities that fit our criteria, and then evaluate them systematically.

00;27;44;13 - 00;28;08;21
Fred Barber
I use this it's a methodology called smarter, the simple multi attribute rating technique employing rankings. There you go. That's a mouthful. but it's it's a it's a method to systematically judge a series of attributes that you rank in your order of importance. And then it says, okay, based upon your ranking, here's the areas that best fit your needs.

00;28;08;24 - 00;28;26;21
Fred Barber
And and honestly, we were surprised. You know, I compiled this data. I looked at a whole bunch of different areas around the metroplex, and I was really surprised with what came out on top, because it wasn't what we were thinking of initially. And but yeah, we, we sort of walked in the neighborhood and were like, oh yeah, this does make sense.

00;28;26;23 - 00;28;58;01
Fred Barber
And we fell in love with it, you know? But more importantly, we cut our housing cost more than 50%, cut our property tax down 60%, are homeowners down 40%. Lawn care went to zero. you know, it is. It's freed up thousands of dollars a month in our budget. yeah. And we took we took the surplus cash, put that in a basket of balanced ETFs and it's just set in.

00;28;58;01 - 00;29;26;01
Fred Barber
Forget it right now. Look, my core audience who I'm really in essence speaking to is that, you know, empty nester pre retired. look, you know, we're dispersed family and friend network. But they're I'm talking to 10 to 15 million people in America that fit that definition. Right. but there's no reason that a lot of these same principles, you know, couldn't be used by someone in their 20s or 30s, you know, as a young couple, divorcee, whatever.

00;29;26;01 - 00;29;42;00
Fred Barber
There's all kinds of situations of people who really should be looking critically at where do they live. You know, why and how to maximize this asset financially while creating freedom and reduce stress in your life.

00;29;42;03 - 00;30;21;06
Jason Croft
Oh, yeah. And that's what's great, too, about having this concept in your head when you are younger and you're not to that stage, well, you're going to make some different decisions. When you have more options, you're heading to rather than per one typical. This is what you do. You get to retirement and this you can start. You could actually maybe you maybe you stay on that same path that some folks do to get, you know, their kids off and all that stuff, and they grow that equity in that house, but they do it really purposefully, and they know that exit that's going to happen at this exact stage right down to the month, because, hey,

00;30;21;06 - 00;30;29;04
Jason Croft
we've got it plan. We know exactly where we're moving now because we've used this database. And and you have that dialed in.

00;30;29;06 - 00;30;57;29
Fred Barber
But I think I think we need to fundamentally keep in mind that the suburbs are killing us. but I don't think we've really, you know, brought that reality home that that when we engineer a sedentary lifestyle. So even if, yes, I need to be in a place that has great schools or whatever, focus on that walkability. Increasingly, these New Urbanism communities are not just in city centers, you know, some of them are many of them.

00;30;57;29 - 00;31;27;02
Fred Barber
Increasingly, you go to Frisco Square and the Dallas area that I'm sure you know pretty well, right, fits the model very well. You've got a brand new HDB a couple blocks away. Not not to mention all and and fantastic schools. So it is possible to get the notion of walkability and, you know, a tight urban district community and not sacrifice not not put yourself in an area that's going to have lower quality schools or higher crime.

00;31;27;04 - 00;31;34;19
Fred Barber
Right? Those and again, my database makes that searchable. I'll help you find hundreds of communities in America that fit that profile.

00;31;34;21 - 00;31;42;10
Jason Croft
Yeah, that's great because that's that's a great point too. It's it's not just.

00;31;42;12 - 00;32;09;10
Jason Croft
What maybe you and your spouse are putting up with or doing for, let's say, 20 years in a in the suburb. You're right. Not that that's a small thing, because that sedentary lifestyle can wreak havoc in those 20 years. But also we're we're teaching our kids during those 20 years. This is how you live. This is what you do.

00;32;09;17 - 00;32;20;28
Jason Croft
You sit down, you get in a car. So of course that's what happens for their next 20 years because that's just what we do. Right. And so breaking that cycle with.

00;32;21;00 - 00;32;25;23
Fred Barber
The IPO, developing type two diabetes.

00;32;25;25 - 00;32;50;11
Jason Croft
Yeah. It's so you have to be able to break that cycle right now. And to think about it on that front as well, that's that's so powerful. And that's again that's that's something that's talked around I think. And and nobody is bringing that forward enough from a practical day to day. Yes. We should go to the gym. Yes, we should lose weight.

00;32;50;11 - 00;33;15;11
Jason Croft
Yes we should. You know, it's all around. We kind of want to. But to talk about it in this very practical way, meaning if, like you said, your 10,000 steps in just living your life, right, not on some journey or, you know, an hour a day in the gym, just living in existing. Hey, you're checking the box on on staying healthy.

00;33;15;13 - 00;33;33;23
Fred Barber
Yeah. That look, you know, I know people who live in you live in Manhattan. That's what they do. But of course, there's there's other aspects of living in Manhattan that, that, that, that are problematic, you know, so, you know, I'm looking at this thing and say it and say, look, you know, figure out a way to design your life around this.

00;33;33;23 - 00;33;54;21
Fred Barber
Honestly, I was looking at this initially from a financial perspective. Right? Was sitting on an over appreciated asset in a house that was only full five days out of the year. Like, why are we here? And a lot of lawn to care for, right? So I was looking at this from, you know, financial and freed up some time by not having to mow the lawn.

00;33;54;24 - 00;34;26;17
Fred Barber
What surprised me, what I got out of the research was how much this tied into health, that, you know, when I started reading the literature on this, it just amazed me how the health benefits of being in a more walkable area, not just, you know, stress reduction and physical activity. The other aspect of, you know, the what Surgeon General Murthy refers to as the epidemic of loneliness, a lot of that is rooted in the lack of, the need for third places as a term misuse.

00;34;26;17 - 00;34;50;18
Fred Barber
So, you know, you have your house, you have your work. Right. And if all you do is drive between those two, you know that you're not naturally involved in third places, and third places can be, you know, the coffee shop, the wine bar, the, the park where you're walking your dog and meeting other people with their dogs, you know, the place of worship, the church, synagogue, whatever those.

00;34;50;18 - 00;35;21;14
Fred Barber
And if those become an integral part of that community, that's part of your normal routine of how you live your life. That creates a greater sense of social cohesion, which has all these other health benefits. you know, interestingly, it's also even correlated with being more politically active. People that are more connected in their community are more likely to vote, are more likely to even maybe go to a town council meeting or, you know, get involved in a local issue like that.

00;35;21;16 - 00;35;51;29
Fred Barber
so there's all these other benefits that flow from the type of place you choose. Now, again, I've combine this with this semi-nomadic option because the reality is for a vast number of, of Americans in particular. But, you know, people in any Western culture, we have family here with friends spread far and wide. you know, we've organized our lives so that we're spending a couple weeks every summer in Vancouver where we built some great relationships up there with a a little summer institute.

00;35;51;29 - 00;36;15;04
Fred Barber
We go to, at the University of British Columbia, done the last two years, hope to do it for a few more years. And hey, when it's 105 degrees in Texas and it's 70 degrees in Vancouver, I'm all about that, right? But, you know, I also work for a European company. I have an office in Prague. And, you know, we're like, okay, we're to go spend a month of the year in Prague, right?

00;36;15;08 - 00;36;38;24
Fred Barber
And get a beer, a B and be there for, for a couple weeks. I have my business colleagues there. we have, old friend who moved to Vienna a few years ago. Okay, that's a couple hours away. Let's go see them. You know, so you can build in these aspects of nomad nomadism while still maintaining that home base.

00;36;38;26 - 00;37;03;28
Fred Barber
another thing I point it point to in the organization called Remote Year that I bumped into a couple years ago. Fascinating program. So you basically you join like 20 to 30 other people that spend a month in a different city of the world, and they provide you with a furnished apartment and a co-working membership. Right. so, you know, you're you're not alone doing that.

00;37;03;28 - 00;37;26;10
Fred Barber
You're doing this with this group of people. You do it for one month, four months, a year, whatever you want. so, yeah, friend of mine went to meet in Colombia with them last. Last December. This is a good friend. He's divorced, doesn't have really tight family, parent relationships. And he's like, you know, Christmas is always a little lonely and depressing.

00;37;26;12 - 00;37;33;13
Fred Barber
So I said, why do you go and join remote here and join 25 other people in Medellin, Colombia, for a month?

00;37;33;15 - 00;38;02;27
Jason Croft
Heck yeah, I love that one. That's the other piece of it too. That's it's it's even if you don't have those relationships yet that just the mind expanding, again, emotional expanding aspect of travel. The more you do, the more you are opened to the world. And and yeah, all of that. And just to be purposeful with that connection, building out in the world.

00;38;03;03 - 00;38;17;09
Fred Barber
Is one of the reasons I'm on the cover of the book. We put the, we put the RV and yeah, this is it's for probably for trademark reasons. That's not actually an Airstream in the way is designed. That's the basic idea.

00;38;17;12 - 00;38;19;08
Jason Croft
But esters are nice. They are, they.

00;38;19;08 - 00;38;45;19
Fred Barber
Are, they are. Yeah. The funny thing is, if I cover design or initially had had to swallow a truck, like you're not pulling something that big with it with, without a crew cab. So. Yeah. Yeah. So we chose to add a travel trailer into our mix for our nomadism. and then, you know, we joined a group called escapees, which, has all these affinity groups of people at different life stages go in different places.

00;38;45;21 - 00;39;10;09
Fred Barber
And you basically discover a community of like minded, really nice people, that, you know, we're increasingly yeah, we're going down this a little bit to starting to get, you know, get our feet wet in a space. but it's just been a really fun way of it, you know, of not just getting out and exploring and seeing new things, but also when we go to see family or friends in another city, we're not imposing, all right?

00;39;10;10 - 00;39;14;08
Fred Barber
Because we bring our motel room with us.

00;39;14;10 - 00;39;44;19
Jason Croft
Oh, yeah. That's great, I love it. You brought up something as we we kind of wrap here and I want to I'm going to give some people some, some directive of where to go to learn more. You brought up this great point, really speaking specifically to my audience of coaches consultants as this added tool. And I just love this concept that for there's I mean, there's plenty of of clients and audience members of mind who this could just be perfect for themselves.

00;39;44;21 - 00;40;13;13
Jason Croft
But having this life scapes system, you know, as a tool to point their clients to as they're walking someone through either financial, you know, they're trying to get their business on track, they're trying to get this to have this tool to go. Have you ever thought about this, this, this concept, this fully fleshed out concept? Not again. Just the vagaries of like, well, you could sell your house and go, you know, travel around.

00;40;13;15 - 00;40;37;15
Jason Croft
Cool. How do I do that? You know, but here's this fully fleshed system of not only could you do it, but it's really makes more sense for you financially and everything. If you go and do that, talk to me about how like, I guess, pointing someone in, kind of embracing that aspect as a, as a coach to go, oh, well, I guess I could use this beyond just the book.

00;40;37;17 - 00;40;39;26
Jason Croft
What kind of calls action could you give to them?

00;40;39;28 - 00;40;57;14
Fred Barber
Yeah. So on the on the website Life scapes.info is the is the website that actually the.com is a, it's some organization in Wyoming. So something so I haven't, I haven't gone to them to buy their, buy their domain yet, but like skills dot two.

00;40;57;14 - 00;41;02;19
Jason Croft
Strikes against Wyoming in this interview. Let's do they'll give us a third Wyoming.

00;41;02;19 - 00;41;24;19
Fred Barber
Maybe it's in Montana I don't know but it anywhere life skis.info is the website that has the model, section on that. You create a little user account. It's free, by the way. So, you know, you go in and you put in the criteria that are important to you and it pulls up a list of neighborhoods, and I'll build in more functionality down the road here.

00;41;24;19 - 00;41;43;19
Fred Barber
And I, I may build in some more fee based services, you know, as I get, you know, more use of it and kind of learn what the market needs. Because really, I could see a coach, you know, definitely using something like to say, hey, you know, here's what's important to you. Let's put those attributes in and we'll help find a sort of places.

00;41;43;19 - 00;42;11;21
Fred Barber
Now we'll start looking at, you know, what are the housing costs? What are the options there? What are the specific schools? What are the community resource? Right then in the book I talk a lot about things like domicile, taxation. you know, all the very practical aspects. you know, taxes vary hugely in your choice of a location could have a massive impact on your total taxation.

00;42;11;23 - 00;42;31;18
Fred Barber
I actually walk through a series of examples in the book about, you know, how to figure out because a lot of people say, well, hey, I want to be in Texas because it doesn't have a state income tax, your state income tax there in Colorado, but your property tax is so much lower, the chances are you're paying less total tax than I am for a comparable house right there.

00;42;31;19 - 00;42;49;07
Fred Barber
Interesting. Yeah, yeah. you know, again, not I'm not a CPA, but my wife is and so, you know, we so we laid out some of those, you know, so some of those issues of how do you calculate what it actually cost to live in a different place. So those tools are there, they're laid out systematically.

00;42;49;07 - 00;43;08;14
Fred Barber
There's a lot of information. All the all the content of the book is also on the website, on like sketched out info. and if you create a little user account on the model, you can save, searches and have those available, and you'll be able to look at it as a, as a tool in that decision making process.

00;43;08;16 - 00;43;35;07
Jason Croft
So great, I love that. I mean, I can see so easily people specifically being like scape coaches in this to do exactly, you know, take somebody through exactly what you're talking about and being that advisor and provide those solutions out there in similar ways, that financial planners do or, you know, being an aspect of that without all the regulation, you have to go and help people.

00;43;35;11 - 00;43;57;25
Fred Barber
One of the first reviews of my book on Amazon was actually a retirement financial planner. And oh, wow, you've read it. And he's like, this is great stuff. And then he emailed me directly and said, hey, can I can I put a, you know, a, blurb about your book in my newsletter? It goes all my clients, I absolutely, you know, so look right now, today on view to selling books and pointing people on the website, you know, where this goes.

00;43;57;25 - 00;44;11;11
Fred Barber
You talk about, you know, this might be my own coaching business. It may very well be, you know, a gig in the future. I don't know, this is step one, but step one was a lot of work to get to do the research and get the content put together.

00;44;11;13 - 00;44;37;10
Jason Croft
Oh yeah. And I think that's what's, that's what's you're, you're you're all your good work is showing because it's sparking this. It's sparking that in that retirement financial planner. It's sparking this in me to go, oh this could be the because it's so robust, that initial work that you've put into this and putting this full concept together. So I congratulate you for that.

00;44;37;10 - 00;44;40;17
Jason Croft
And it's, it's it shows through like Jay said, I.

00;44;40;17 - 00;44;42;19
Fred Barber
Really appreciate that it that means.

00;44;42;19 - 00;45;06;21
Jason Croft
A little. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. This is this is fantastic. Well I think it's I think it's it's really clear already we've painted that picture of who this is for. And absolutely where they need to go live scapes.info for sure. What's what do you see as sort of next for you in this realm? As you roll this out and have more conversations about it?

00;45;06;24 - 00;45;29;05
Fred Barber
You know, I think there's additional opportunities for product ization of the concept. I could see, you know, using what's currently on the website is like a freemium. So people are able to come in and play around and get some ideas, but I think there are more value added services that I will build in. I'd be interested in actually, building in an affiliation relationship with a realtor network.

00;45;29;05 - 00;45;46;29
Fred Barber
So you're looking to move your hey will refer you to a realtor who, you know, is is, you know, accredited with the model, understands what they're doing and can help you find the place. Even things like, you know, sort of a concierge service. So like, hey, you know, I'm somebody says I'm looking to to relocate, and I've narrowed down my search.

00;45;46;29 - 00;46;10;25
Fred Barber
I'm looking at, you know, Charlotte, North Carolina or Greenville, South Carolina. You know, maybe there's a way in which one of these I talk about. It's a low cost probe. Right. Before you make a major decision, get the RV and be there for a week. Get to know the community. And there may be a way of packaging that up, that low cost probe experience, that could be offered out there as a service.

00;46;10;27 - 00;46;34;24
Jason Croft
Oh yeah. That is a yeah, there's a standalone thing for that I love it. Yeah. Partnering with, you know, going beyond the obvious, you know, verbose or Airbnbs but to okay for the networks who are really talking to those traveling nurses, for instance, partnering with those folks and in sponsorship and affiliates, you're going.

00;46;34;24 - 00;46;53;00
Fred Barber
To be checking on an area, okay, how do I get an introduction? How do I know what's the best coffee shop in the area? Or how do I how can I actually be introduced to some people who live there? Can I talk to the local police about crime? Right. You know, a realtor cannot discuss that with you. They they cannot tell you whether an area is high or low crime.

00;46;53;00 - 00;47;14;04
Fred Barber
It's in their their code of ethics. They can't even really talk about the quality of the schools. Right. There's things that they, that they, they are not allowed to discuss. But wouldn't it be great if you were considering a move to be able to actually, you know, have a chat with a cop who works that area, right, because they're going to tell you things.

00;47;14;06 - 00;47;31;10
Jason Croft
Oh yeah. Well, yeah. Because that's and that's we all I mean, most of us have experience of that too. Like there's data or the headlines or whatever. Say one thing. But did it's okay. That's true. Those numbers are true and feel kind of high. But that's really in this pocket.

00;47;31;12 - 00;47;32;26
Fred Barber
Oh yeah. Yeah. Crime is extremely.

00;47;32;26 - 00;47;34;00
Jason Croft
Localized.

00;47;34;02 - 00;47;51;04
Fred Barber
Yeah, yeah. And even in areas where like the overall schools may not have a great rating. Well you know, what are the men in schools like. Right. You know, what are the what are the private schools in that area. So that kind of detailed local knowledge be great. If you could package it up and just, you know, offer that as a like I say, concierge service.

00;47;51;07 - 00;47;57;01
Fred Barber
So these are ideas I'm working on. The books went out a few weeks ago. Give me give you a, you know, a month or two to flesh this out.

00;47;57;04 - 00;48;06;02
Jason Croft
Come on. This should already be ready. Down, Fred. Come on, let's go. You should have six LLCs already put together based on this and go. Yeah.

00;48;06;02 - 00;48;10;03
Fred Barber
I also have a full time job.

00;48;10;05 - 00;48;20;21
Jason Croft
I hear all I hear is excuses, Fred. That's all I hear. I know this is this is great. I really enjoyed the book. I love the concept. And, I'm excited that you're that you're rolling this out.

00;48;20;23 - 00;48;28;20
Fred Barber
Excellent. Jason, thank you so much. I've been enjoy listening to your podcast and, you know, you put out some great content, so it's great to get to know you.

00;48;28;22 - 00;48;59;14
Jason Croft
Now, I appreciate that. Likewise. And we'll see you all next time. Thanks so much for tuning in and being a part of this show. If you want help creating authority, building video content or even a client generator show of your own, go to Media Leads co.com and let's connect. I'll talk to you soon on the next strategy in action.

00;48;59;17 - 00;49;00;09
Jason Croft
This show is.

00;49;00;09 - 00;49;06;23
Fred Barber
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