In this episode of WealthTalk, Kevin Whelan, Founder of WealthBuilders, discusses the inspiration behind the company and why building assets is far more rewarding than simply trading time for money.
Kevin introduces the game-changing concept of SSAS pensions, revealing how they offer unparalleled control, flexibility, and tax efficiency compared to traditional pensions. He shares real-life success stories of individuals who have transformed their financial futures using SSAS, particularly through savvy property investments.
But that's not all - Kevin passionately shares the importance of financial literacy for children, highlighting how early education can secure their future. He also delves into legacy planning, offering tips on how to pass on not just wealth, but the wisdom to manage it effectively.
Tune in to gain valuable insights on building and protecting your wealth, ensuring that your financial legacy lasts for generations.
Whether you're an investor, parent, or simply looking to take control of your financial future, this episode is packed with actionable advice you won't want to miss!
Resources Mentioned In This Episode:
>> The Power of SSAS Pensions for Property Investors [Property118 Blog]
>> How To Turn Your Assets into Cashflow: Your 90-Day Plan to Build Recurring Income [Register here]
Next Steps On Your Wealth Building Journey:
>> Join the WealthBuilders Facebook Community
>> Schedule a 1:1 call with one of our team
>> Become a member of WealthBuilders
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Christian Rodwell (00:02.412)
The purpose of Wealth Talk is to educate, inform and hopefully entertain you on the subject of building your wealth. Wealth Builders recommends you should always take independent financial, tax or legal advice before making any decisions around your finances. Today's episode is brought to you by Wealth Builders Membership, a proven step -by -step process that helps you achieve financial security within two to three years. find out more, head to wealthbuilders .co .uk forward slash membership.
Hello and welcome to this week's episode of Wealth Talk. My name is Christian Rodwell and this week I have for you an insightful interview with wealth builders founder Kevin Whelan from his recent appearance on Property 118 TV. And in today's interview, Kevin shares the inspiration behind starting wealth builders and the importance of building assets instead of trading time for money, emphasizing the importance of financial literacy for children and legacy planning. Now he also explains what a SaaS pension is.
and how it differs from other pension schemes, highlighting the control and flexibility that it offers. And Kevin discusses the benefit of using a SaaS pension for property investment and shares success stories of individuals who have used a SaaS pension to grow their wealth. Now, if you'd like to chat with us about your pension and see if we can help you to take control and make it work harder for you, or have a chat with us about how to grow your wealth and create multiple streams of income, please get in touch.
you can drop us an email at hello at wealthbuilders .co .uk or head to our website, www .wealthbuilders .co .uk and schedule a call at time that's convenient for you. Okay, let's head now to that interview between Property 118 TV host, Gabriella Van Genyans and Kevin Whelan.
Thank so much for joining me today, Kevin. It's really great to have you on to talk more about wealth builders and in particular we'll talk more about SaaS pensions. But before I pick your brain on SaaS pensions, it'll be really great to talk to you more about wealth builders. So like its name suggests, it's obviously dedicated to helping individuals build wealth through education and planning. It'll be really nice to hear from yourself.
Christian Rodwell (02:24.534)
about what inspired you to start wealth builders? I think there are two chapters to the story. Both quite poignant. The first really stemmed from when I was at university. I got an economics degree and my father died on a North Sea oil rig in his 40s. And that was tragic in itself, but as a business owner himself, had a good business. I used to
provide agency staff for BP and for Shell, big companies up on the North Sea. And we were doing really quite well. Unfortunately, when he died, things didn't quite pan out that way. So what in fact happened is he didn't make a will, he didn't have any life cover to protect the mortgage, didn't have a business succession plan. Not that I knew what one was then.
But everything sort of went backwards. So as well as dealing with a family tragedy, the family finances went in reverse. And as a young economist at the time, feeling a couple of years later, really, that because me and my father were sort of genetic peas in a pod, so to speak, Gabriella, we walked to say, we talked to say, know, people could tell I was his son. And I thought,
well if I go when he went he had a massive heart attack when he was 46 then I need to have a little think and my thinking came out which was the not the birth of wealth builders but the birth of my own wealth thinking which was never to trade time for money but to build assets instead not that I thought about what they would be at that time but just decided I had to own things
rather than do things and hopefully you get the difference. And so I spent the next, I suppose, clock forward from, what was that, around about 89, 90. It took me about 15 years to become financially independent, paid my mortgage off completely, several thousand pounds a month coming in automatically. Didn't need to work again. And decided this was an interesting thing to teach because all around me people were really struggling, you know, they
Christian Rodwell (04:47.534)
They were not struggling to earn a living. People never struggled to earn a living. What they struggled to do is recognize the difference between trading time for money, work income, and owning assets that generate asset income. And I started doing this one -on -one. Worked really well. People got it. And I thought, it's interesting. So decided to essentially create a program. And all that came around sort of 2000.
2009 so the second part of story is I was an IFA at the time. You usual independent financial advisors doing the best they can. Stock market you're probably too young to remember but the stock market crashed completely in 2008 and ordinary people lost 30 40 percent of their value of their holdings in a heartbeat. And nobody could do anything about it and we've subsequently seen black swan events like that.
for example, we saw that coming. And actually only today we've seen a 2 % wipe off footsie in a day because of fears of what's going on in America and the current unrest isn't helping that. So I decided that probably being an IFA wasn't the best thing. How best now to teach that so I combine my skills with others and we've written programs, created a whole bunch of
education around seven and only seven assets you can use to build your wealth and that's my IP and I've written three books now on the subject of wealth and I'm very pleased and proud that we have an outstanding reputation not just for doing good work ourselves but for curating really really good people who do a good job themselves. So often people will come to us and they'll want to signpost to somebody else and we spent the last decade just building
really good people to make that signpost, whether it's in property, whether it's in business, whole raft of different things. if we get a chance, we'll talk about those seven assets. But if not, we'll talk about SaaS. But there's always interesting things to talk about. And I'm always pleased to have the opportunity to do that. So thank you very much for the invitation. And although you asked a very short question, I gave a very long answer. And I'm sorry for that.
Christian Rodwell (07:08.994)
No, don't be sorry at all. It was really, really great to hear how wealth builders, how it's doing so well at the moment. And obviously you were saying that about your father, which I'm really, really sorry to hear about. But I suppose it's shaped you massively, really. And of course, I suppose for the next generation as well, as I know you're quite keen into financial literacy for children.
That's a big passion of mine too, because I think the current school system is failing our children when it comes to their financial knowledge. Not that I'm expecting huge things, but just teaching financial responsibility, teaching what money is, how it works. mean, it's not the love of money that's the key here. It's just responsibility dealing with it. Because money permeates and weaves itself through the very fabric.
of our daily lives, so we have to manage it well. And I think increasingly as I'm seeing people tap, tap, tapping, tapping on their car, tapping on their phone, there's no money exchanging hands anymore and money's become increasingly invisible. And I think the next generation, your generation probably, are gonna be poorer than the one before for the first time in our history and I'd like to do something about that. we've created a program for the parents, not for the children.
to be great money role models for their kids. Of all ages, I'm a granddad now, my kids are grown and gone, but they're still my kids, right? So, I'm passionate about that. I love to teach, I love to share, and I love to try and help the concept of legacy, which is not just money, but knowledge and wisdom that goes with that, so that money can continue to support future generations of my family and future generations of other people's families too.
I think that's really, really great. And as you were saying, I think in schools, they just don't teach it enough. I know certainly from my experience, when I was younger in school, there wasn't really an emphasis on that. It was very much just the curriculum of maths, not really sort of this financial literacy. So I think it's really, really great what you are doing. And I suppose, yeah, you're very welcome. And I suppose as well.
Christian Rodwell (09:33.966)
There's a common misconception when people think about building wealth because they think, I can do it really quick and easily. But in fact, it takes a lot more longer than it actually does. Well, I think it took me 15 years and I mentioned that early on, but there were no books. was no there wasn't even Internet, Gabriella. There, you know, you were writing letters to people. There was no email. I think what I know now and what I've
distilled into lessons can be taught and can be executed and mistakes that other people have made can be condensed into lessons for other people to learn from. So if you surround yourself with good people and you resonate with whoever's sharing the knowledge with you, I think most people could probably get there in about five years. So five years to be financially secure for the rest of your life. And most people don't get there.
in 35 years. You know, they simply drift, earning money, spending money, saving money, but almost always for the long term, you know, I suppose, retiring probably, you know, in their 60s, and that's getting further and further back. And no political change is going to make that any different. the macro picture, the big picture is the country can't afford
people pensions in the way they paid them in the past. So that has to change. But unfortunately, the change means more of that responsibility will fall on individuals, business owners. And often they're not thinking about that. They're just turning over that tyranny of routine of their day -to -day life and as a result, don't really build substantial wealth. Yet it's easy to do just by dedicating a few hours, honestly, a few hours a month.
just to take one small step every single month. And it's the constant action, but the right action that can get people where they want to get to once they discover that. And so part of my job, or two parts really, one is to help people discover it. And then two is to help them determine whether we'd be a good fit to work with them. And we're pleased that our TrustPilot reviews and our reviews are outstanding.
Christian Rodwell (12:03.054)
and many people like to work with us and we're pleased about that. So yeah, it's a big challenge, right? 95 % of the population, Gabriella, don't make it to financial independence. So it's a big challenge to move the needle from 5 % to 6 % to 7%. I think it's gonna be a tough ask in my lifetime, but hopefully there are enough good people, not just what I do, but good work that you guys do and others can help.
get people more money back that they can then reuse, that they can get their taxes back, which is obviously the biggest drain on people's wherewithal these days, and that's going to get worse. Again, for macro reasons, the tax takers got to go up. There's no argument about that. It's just political maneuvering as to how it will shape itself out. So we look for all the most tax -efficient ways that it's possible to build wealth and none other.
are none more important and none more exciting, even though the terminology is pretty drab. The subject of SaaS, which I know is something you kindly did an article for, for wealth builders on SaaS in property 118. So we're very grateful for that. So thank you for that. you're very welcome. Yes. As Kevin was saying, that is an article on the property 118 website. We will add it in the link below. So
viewers can check it out. And obviously you were just talking about that, about SAS pensions. So firstly, for people that have absolutely no idea what a SAS pension is, can you just firstly explain what it is and how it differs from other pension schemes as well? Yeah, so first of all, just to preface this by saying, you know, whenever you're on a journey of discovery to building wealth, you're going to learn new language.
whether it's tax language, property language, this is pension language. And pension language is steeped in grayness and dreariness, unfortunately. SAS, small self -administered scheme. SAS, nothing to do with the armed forces, nothing to do with software as a service. It's really nothing more than a business owner's pension. It's a pension that traditionally, all pensions are trust funds, okay? So every pension is a trust.
Christian Rodwell (14:26.668)
is a tax -free trust, there's no capital gains tax, inheritance tax, or corporation tax. So pretty tax -efficient. But for the most part, the challenge is when people have a pension, they delegate the ownership of that pension or the management of that pension to somebody else. So whether it's an insurance company, whether it's an advisor, whether it's their employer, the whole thing means you're in the, more often than not, when you're trying to drive wealth, a pension is part of the vehicle that does that.
But if you're in the backseat in the vehicle, you're not really in control. What a SaaS does, it says, you know, it's small because it's small business. Self -administered means self -directed. You drive it. And scheme just is another word for pension. So it's a small scheme for family business owners, really, to take control. And they put themselves in the front seat. And what we do is we give them the instruction, the confidence to be able to be
A trustee like being a director of a limited company. It's the same really. So if you can run a limited company, you can run a SAS and you don't run it. You direct it. You choose the direction in the same way as you have in a limited company. You'll have maybe bookkeeper, maybe a lawyer, maybe you have people around you to do things that are compliance work. And so it is with SAS. But the real exciting thing is there are so many things you can do.
with the ownership and control of a SaaS pension than any other pension that exists. And while it's not for everyone, certainly within the property sphere, in recent years with government intervention, there's been a proliferation of people setting up limited companies. And if you set up a limited company, that means you're eligible for a SaaS, which is why we've seen thousands of property business owners, as well as traditional business owners,
take control of their pension and we've helped many do that and always happy to explain some of the differences but difference number one you are in control but many other differences too that I'm happy to explain if you want. Yeah absolutely go ahead. Well I think the other one, big one, other than being in control is timing. So you know let's if you're you know if you're starting off
Christian Rodwell (16:55.342)
in business or you're starting off in your property business and you've got pension funds from the past. Traditionally, you can't touch your pension until you're in your 50s. You can take tax -free cash at 55, for example. Now that's moving to 57 in 2028. So again, like state pensions, it's getting later and later and later. But with the SaaS, you can actually use the money that's in the pension to help your business today, to help your wealth.
today, example, you can lend up to 50 % of the value of your pension to your limited company. So if you've got a pot of money and a SaaS can accommodate up to 11 people, that's just law, right? Soon as you get to 12, it's different rules. So up to 11, so you can have husband and wife, business partners, siblings, family members, pooling money together, right? So now you've got, if you had...
two people with 100 ,000, you've now got 200 ,000 and it's simple to see that. And then if you want to, you put those total together and you can lend half of that to your company and then your company can use that and then you're building wealth in your company. No other pension could do that. A traditional workplace pension can't do it, personal pension can't do it, a SIP can't do it. The only pension that allows you to do that is
And I think that's one of the biggest benefits that we see is people lending money to themselves so that their wealth grows today. Not when they're in their 50s and 60s, their wealth can grow today. So, you know, that should get a few people thinking differently. And as you can move traditional pensions, you can pick them up and create a SaaS as long as you've got a limited company and as long as you've got the willingness to drive it.
then you can do it and that's what we look for is to help people first of all think differently and then when they think differently often they feel so different. Whoa I can be in control not just in control of what you can do not just in control of the timing but also control of fees. So very often people are paying fees they don't know what fees they're paying you know the traditional
Christian Rodwell (19:19.278)
pension owner in the UK is paying 2 % of their money in fees. And if the average growth in the stock market is 6%, they're losing a third of their money to somebody else. Well, with the SaaS, you don't have percentages of fees. You have an administrator doing the work, but you're doing all the hard work because you're the one making the decisions. And therefore, as the fees tend to be fixed, let's say it's thousand a year, for example.
If you've got 200 ,000, that's a smaller percentage, isn't it? And then if it's 400 ,000, 1 ,000 a year, it 0 .25? And then if it gets bigger and bigger, the percentage or the total gets smaller, smaller and smaller. So you're getting to keep more of your money. And these are things that are so often overlooked when people just have a pension. They have one and they get their statement. They have a look at it, wish it were better.
and then put it back in the drawer again. There's no interaction with it. So what we try and do is just stimulate that debate and say, have a think about how much of your money you want to give away to a third party or how much you would like to be able to use that money to build wealth now rather than the future. You get the idea and with property, you can use the money to buy commercial property, to do commercial to residential conversions, to collaborate with others and do joint ventures.
You can become a bank and lend money to property developers or property people that you like. You could do crowdfunding, you can do gold, can do even cryptocurrency. So whatever you want to do, and it's not for me to say what people are interested in or fascinated by, but whatever they want to do, pretty much, if the law allows it, they can do it. And the law allows those things that I've just mentioned.
That's so incredibly interesting. And I know you were saying earlier that pensions are sort of boring with all this jargon, but this to me is really, really interesting, particularly with the amount of control that you have with a SaaS pension, which isn't like any other pensions, as you were saying. And I suppose the landlords listening as well, they'll be really, really interested to hear how it can help with property investment, as you were saying. And so for any viewers that are watching this,
Christian Rodwell (21:38.166)
and they're thinking a SAS pension sounds right for me. I suppose they'll be thinking what's a good starting point to start with a SAS pension? mean, how much money should you put or transfer into SAS pension? That's good question. And the answer that I kind of gave, which is a stock answer, it really depends on the size of your ambition. Because if your intention is to build a long term
huge pension fund then. If you start today with zero if you had no pension you just wanted to make contributions from your company so if you've got a company making profits the money that you pay into. Pension is claiming back corporation tax now you think about that anyone who pays corporation tax once they paid that money's gone. But they call used to build their wealth it's part of the economy and that's fine.
But I've never met a business owner yet who doesn't want to pay less corporation tax. Well, they can make a contribution and that contribution comes off their corporation tax bill. And now that means that money is in their life that they can start with. So it also therefore depends on how much profit you're making. If you're a brand new property company and you're still not yet making profits, you you're building that, then I would probably say.
£50 ,000 is a good starting point to have a dialogue. Often people take their time and they should to get their head around this. You and I are talking quite casually, but there's some technical stuff here as you'd expect. And there's eligibility criteria because each scheme is individually approved by HMRC and it's regulated by a different regulator called the pension regulator.
the same people who regulate big company pension schemes for bigger listed companies. So there's lots of regulation, but we know our way around this. don't mean around it, but through it to help people make the most and the best of what they do. And so I'd say you have to have a limited company.
Christian Rodwell (23:57.294)
Probably making either 50 grand worth of profit that you can put in or you've got 50 ,000 to start with and that you're willing and able to learn. But you can't just do it, you've got to learn something. You've got a legal responsibility to be aware of pensions law to a certain degree and we keep that light but nonetheless important and you need a plan, right? So there's no point having a sass and go, right, now what do I do with it?
It typically takes about four or five months to set up and that's just in on revenue time. There's usually plenty of time for us to help people create a plan. So what are you going to do with your money? Who are you going to work with? Is it just you? Is it you and the spouse? Is it you and your brother? it. Upward down, we know we've got SAS is with I think the most we've got seven in the SAS, which is family members up and down the generations. Although you can have up to 11 as I mentioned earlier on.
But typically it's two, three. Almost always husband and wife or partners, business partners, life partners of whatever shape and size, it's just a way to collaborate and make more for your money. And I discovered it sort of somewhere around the 2008, 2009. And when I saw the difference on the control, when I saw the difference
in what I could do, it made a huge difference into the value of my own SaaS, which I run myself. I don't recommend people run it themselves, at least initially. You can. We can teach you how you could be and run your own scheme. And therefore, you pay nobody. You're just paying yourself to run your own SaaS. But yeah, it's just so exciting for those people who've got pensions and want to do something better with it. The other point, you know, you mentioned earlier on,
that I'm big into the concept of legacy. Well, you can invite grown up children in, so when they're 18. Now, what that means is you can invite children, well, they're grownups at that point, obviously, but you can invite them in and they can participate either as learners or doers. So, you you could have husband and wife with a scheme, they've got a son who's say 20, 22, or whatever it is.
Christian Rodwell (26:19.694)
They can bring them into the scheme or they can bring in them in as an observer, almost like giving them instructions, almost like giving them a challenge to say, let's say it was you, Gabriella. Hey, Gabriella, we're going to invite you into the scheme. We're going to pretend that we're allocated 50 ,000 to you. I'd like you to go away and in 30 days come back to me with a plan of what you would like to do with that money.
And then if the plan is a good plan, then we can actually execute that plan because we're in control. And then you can see how your input is adding value to our family's wealth. So it's very much an intergenerational plan. It's a tax planning tool as well, because the next generation inherit the pension, no taxes, no corporation tax, no capital gains tax, no inheritance tax ever.
So when you think about those taxes and the tax take going up, then I haven't seen anything in my lifetime really, and it's quite a long one now, where I've seen anything as tax efficient as SAS. So I commend anyone to explore it. See who you resonate with. We're happy to help, but others do it too. So check them out and have a conversation and have several conversations.
and see where you think this might work for you or it might not work for you because it's not for everyone. Exactly. And that's amazing to hear as well. Sort of you learn and you grow and you plan from it as well. And I know from your line of work, you must have seen lots of success stories of people using a SaaS pension, as I know for the Property Investors Awards, I believe it was Kate and Toby Spayner, was it? Yeah.
they won for the SAS pension at the Property Investors Awards. They did, and they're clients of wealth builders and Toby's now so excited. He's become a coach in our program. So, you know, so inspired was he and Kate. And I remember distinctly, it's quite funny for me, Toby and Kate came to see me in my offices and with a view that there.
Christian Rodwell (28:43.608)
This is too good to be true, this sass thing, but we'll go find out anyway. And Kate, in particular, was quite skeptical, but it took them a while. They did their research, they did their diligence, they realized this was all perfectly legitimate, approval by HMRC, not some sort of tax wheeze, definitely nothing to do with any final tax avoidance scheme. It's a genuine scheme.
It's been going since 1973. mean, know, have been around since then. They're still the best kept secret for directors, but there you go. I'm doing my best, but we can't help everybody. But the whole idea though is people need to spend time to get their head around it. And that's fine. You know, we're more than happy to help people take that time because in many respects, it also then fits into the overall wealth building journey.
Because if you think about a pension, it doesn't have to be property. Yes, of course, property one would eight and we see a lot of property owners. But if you've got, you know, if you've got a business and you want to help your business grow, you can lend your money to your business. If you want to lend money to do some marketing, you could do that. If want to lend money to recruit, you could do that. So can you imagine how many businesses in Covid would have been grateful to know that they could have tapped into their pension for a loan and they would be the bank?
and they'd be lending money to themselves and paying themselves back. And how many business owners who are renting a property would have been grateful to know that their pension could have bought that property. So instead of paying a landlord and that money disappearing out of their wealth life, then they become the tenant and the landlord and that money circling back in their life. And this is the beauty of all of this is
You get to a place where your money is recirculating, tax free, growing so, quickly. And that's why we see not just the Kate and Toby as award winners, but the year before that was a client of mine called Ian. He became an award winner. We did a wonderful project up in Yorkshire. it doesn't, and hopefully we'll win again this year with one of our members, but time will tell on that.
Christian Rodwell (31:08.046)
It's not about awards really, it's about how much difference this makes to the quality of people's wealth, their lives, their confidence, their control and their legacy. for me, for the right people, this is an outstanding opportunity. For the wrong people, it's not right because they don't want to be in control. They're quite happy delegating their money. So like everything, there's pros and cons and I'm happy to explain the pros and cons to everybody because my team do the same.
We don't want to encourage people to have a SaaS if it's not right for them. Exactly. Well, thank you, Kevin, because we are running out of time. But thank you so much for talking about SaaS pensions. And I hope people that watch this video consider a SaaS pension as well. So thank you so much, Kevin. We really appreciate you coming on. Thank you. Thanks for the invitation. Cheers now. Bye bye.
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