For the full interview please listen to the most recent CM Group- Free Lunch Podcast, Episode 77 “Mountains and Markets with David Rosell”
Colin and Greg: Today, we welcome David Rosell to the show. David, welcome to the Free Lunch podcast.
David: Colin, Greg, great to be here with you!
Colin and Greg: Well, listen, David, just for the listeners, where are you joining us from today?
David: I am just south of the border and beautiful Bend, Oregon in the Cascade Mountains.
Colin and Greg: That sounds lovely, and I think that's going to tie in to a little bit of what we talk about today. But tell us your story, what's your background and how did it help shape you personally and professionally?
David: In a nutshell, I've only had two jobs in my entire career and been self-employed for both of them. Started my first business at the age of 15 seal coating driveways. Not sure if you have driveway seal coating North of the border up there, but I did my dad's driveway then started doing the neighbours. Fifteen years later at the age of 30, I sold that company. We were still coating about 1,200 driveways a summer. The beautiful thing was we had to shut down operations due to mother nature and temperatures in the wintertime, so I would just travel the globe with my backpack. I was one of those few Americans that did not put a Canadian flag on the back of my pack.
Colin and Greg: Ok, we won't hold that against you.
David: Interestingly enough, I learned through that business about retirement planning. I was making some good money in my youth. I had some wonderful financial lessons from both my grandmother and my father. We set up our versions of retirement plans, the IRAs, and just started reading books on finance and investing. A lot of friends and family members started coming to me asking me for financial advice, and I thought, I think my next calling is becoming a planner. Twenty years ago, I got the licensing down here, worked for a large insurance company for the first seven years, learned about planning, got my credentials and we've had an independent firm here in Bend, Oregon ever since.
Colin and Greg: You are an adventurer and I think we're going to hear from you how that helped shaped some of your views on retirement and planning and that kind of thing. So tell us a bit about the adventurer’s side of you.
David: One of the serendipitous things that happened is with this driveway paving company. It gave me the ability, based on time and having some financial resources, to just take off. I started off going to Australia and New Zealand, which were the safe places to go because they spoke English down there. I spent six months down there and came back and seal coated more driveways and then met people down there that were coming down from Southeast Asia and I was like, you could backpack through Asia. So the next six months, I was living with mom and dad at the time. Still, I spent six months off traveling through that part of the world and was just really amazed, loved meeting people that were different from my hometown and different languages and food and cultures. Ten years after college, I spent a month in 65 countries around the world, and it really helped shaped who I am today.
Colin and Greg: …and climbing, I think, is one of your passions. Tell us a little bit about that.
David: Yeah, I first got into it when I was in Nepal. Some of the listeners out there have probably heard of the Annapurna circuit, but it's a 21-day self-guided trek on the airplane through Pakistan over to Kathmandu. Sitting next to me was another Westerner, a gentleman named Ashley from England. Interestingly enough, he was planning on doing the same trek. The two of us completed this together, formed an amazing friendship and what I do today is really mesh two of my passions in life. A lot of people think reading about finance is quite boring. What I've done over the years is started writing books that start each chapter with one of my more riveting travel stories that then lead into a financial lesson specifically for people who are at or near retirement.
For more questions and answers with David Rosell please refer to our Podcast.
Stay safe, stay happy, stay well!
-The CM Group