In this episode of WealthTalk, hosts Christian Rodwell and Kevin Whelan unpack the current financial landscape — one marked by uncertainty and fear. They discuss how these emotions can shape financial decisions, particularly for small business owners and those approaching retirement. The conversation explores the complexities of taxation, the importance of long-term wealth planning, and the value of a supportive community when navigating financial challenges. Christian and Kevin also highlight the power of building wealth through assets and creating a Family Wealth Fortress to secure lasting financial stability in turbulent times.
In this week’s WealthTalk, Christian Rodwell and founder Kevin Whelan tackle the growing anxiety among UK business owners and investors as the autumn budget looms and economic headlines fuel uncertainty. They explore why fear-driven, knee-jerk financial decisions can be so damaging—and how to reframe your approach to build lasting, recurring income streams. The conversation covers government policy changes, inheritance tax, business succession, and practical steps to regain control, supported by real-life member stories and actionable advice.
Key Topics Covered
1. Current Economic Uncertainty & Its Impact
2. The Danger of Knee-Jerk Reactions
3. Tax & Inheritance Changes: What You Need to Know
4. Why Building Wealth is About Long-Term Planning
5. Member Success Story: John’s Journey
6. Practical Steps to Regain Control
7. The Power of Community & Trusted Guidance
Actionable Takeaways
Final Thoughts
Don’t let fear or headlines dictate your financial future. Build a system of assets that funds your lifestyle, and you’ll always have control—no matter what changes come your way. Stay tuned for our post-budget episode and more practical guides to help you on your journey.
Resources & Next Steps
Connect with Us:
Next Steps On Your WealthBuilding Journey:
If you enjoyed this episode, please rate and review WealthTalk on your favourite podcast platform
Speaker 2 (00:00.064)
Everywhere you look right now, the money headlines are worrying, aren't they? We've got the autumn budget just weeks away and small business owners are getting pretty nervous about what might be announced.
Yeah, it's scary. There's uncertainty. Turbulence, let's say. There's always a storm brewing, it seems, these days. Hence the sort of knee-jerk reactions that we see from people.
It definitely feels like fear is driving financial decisions at the moment. And we know that fear and reactive behavior and short-term thinking, the opposite of what builds lasting family wealth.
Speaker 2 (00:32.846)
Welcome to this week's episode of WealthTalk. name's Christian Rodwell, the membership director for WealthBuilders, joined today by our founder, Mr. Kevin Whelan. Hi, Kevin.
Chris, good to be with you again. I'm surprised we're still here. We've done 300 and something now. I thought we were going to take a bit of a breather, but here we are again.
Well, I'll talk about sending shockwaves out through the community. I know we had a few people worried that we were going to pack it in, but talking of shockwaves, Kevin, everywhere you look right now, the money headlines are worrying, aren't they? We've got the autumn budget just weeks away, 26th of November, and small business owners are getting pretty nervous about what might be announced. We've had Kirsty Allsop announcing that property sales are dead, blaming budget rumors and high transactions for a very slow market. And Savers.
who were rushing to grab their 25 % pension tax-free cash, worried that it could be cut amidst more uncertainty from the chancellor. yeah, everywhere you look. And even one new article that's just popped up, older generations turning to buy now pay later more than ever. So that figure has doubled in the last 12 months.
Yeah, it's scary. And, you know, I was talking to somebody who I've known for a very long time, who's built a very sizable HMO portfolio, and he's saying he's running scared about the idea of national insurance contributions being applied to his rental income. You know, so everywhere you look, there's uncertainty, turbulence, let's say. You know, there's always a storm brewing, it seems these days, not just weather that we've got to deal with, but economic.
Speaker 1 (02:05.688)
genuine storms that in many respects are caused by the government sort of creating that uncertainty. Hence the sort of knee-jerk reactions that we see from people because, you know, there's a, did a post on LinkedIn recently just about the inheritor's tax on pensions, right? And, you know, somebody commented and I appreciate free speeches there. So anybody's entitled to a different.
opinion from me. Actually, what might be interesting, Chris, as we look at this turbulence, right? Why don't we get CHAT GPT to say what they would do and then compare it to what I think, right? And let's have a bit of fun with it. But anyway, this guy said almost. Well, you know, I completely disagree with you. I think pensions are for retirement income only and almost that's it, right? And I appreciate that's the government view that pensions are for retirement, but
You see, you don't plan your pension in a vacuum. You don't plan your pension for a few years. You plan it for a lifetime. And my entire life's work or part of it created and fueled by, you know, my complete strength and determination to create a legacy from the next generation, largely because my own father died very young. And everybody who knows my story knows that's a passion of mine to leave an outstanding legacy. Then, you know, I think it's inappropriate.
to cancel and say, well, we let you think your pension would give you a retirement income, but if you do a great job and you're financially independent and you don't need your pension, tough, we're going to tax it. And I think it's just not right that the planning that you put into it for 25, 30 years in some cases can be undone in one parliamentary knee-jerk reaction themselves.
Because the problem with governments is that they work on this sort of cycle, which is entirely driven by the need to maintain power. It's not a cycle based on long-term planning. If it was, we'd have a complete refresh on what's going on with the state pension. We wouldn't keep the triple lock because we can't afford it. We can't afford the civil service pensions and the continuation of final salary pensions for every
Speaker 1 (04:32.718)
for nobody else but them really. And my concern is the future taxpayer who doesn't know they're going to have to pay that bill will be paying it and they'll be our kids. So in some respects, you know, I'm acknowledging the governments have got the figures wrong and wanting to look after my family. And the very act of them not getting the figures right and keep kicking it down the line, every parliament they kick this problem further and further away is leaving a black hole in the economy that
The power to want to maintain that power is simply meant they'll go anywhere they can to try and find money to fill the black hole that they've created for themselves. So I'm not political. I don't have a political view about one party or another thing. Every party kicks it down the line, hoping that one day, someday, somebody will take care of it. But my view about this is my family is my family, and I want to plan how I
build my own wealth and how I leave it to the next generation. And I should be allowed to plan without knee-jerk interventions, which are currently now coming in every which way you look, whether you're a business owner, a farm owner, a property owner, a pension owner, you're being hammered from every direction. And no surprise is that people are taking knee-jerk reaction. Of course, we always advocate against that and not doing that, but you can't stop people.
from being fearful and therefore trying to do anything they can because they think a government intervention tomorrow can affect them the day after. So yes, it's worrying times.
You mentioned chat GPT earlier. I do use a bit of chat GPT on occasion when I'm researching, helps me to do some really good deep research for these podcasts. So we'll unpack some of those headlines. You've done a good job already Kevin, but we'll see if I've got any extra points to stimulate some more comments from you. But it definitely feels like fear is driving financial decisions at the moment. And we know, and we talk about on the podcast, that fear and reactive behavior and short-term thinking, the opposite.
Speaker 2 (06:37.878)
of what builds lasting family wealth. So hopefully by listening to today's episode, we'll reframe some of these things going on. you said just now actually fear is natural, people hate uncertainty, but reacting to these headlines, it can lead to some bad decisions. Some of those raiding your pension early, selling property in a panic mode or taking on short-term credit that chips away at retirement security. take a bit of breathing space and we're going to talk about some actions later, but
Sometimes when you have a big financial decision, it's good to give yourself a few days, isn't it? To seek some advice, to speak to other people, to do your research, not to just make a decision that you might regret.
Unquestionably, that will be solid guidance to give anybody. Part of the challenge, I think, is the source of information that people turn to is fanning the flames of their discontent. So the press will be picking up on the bad news, the TV will pick up on the bad news, and they'll fuel that. And that's a concern to me. And often people are making decisions, as you've already said, in haste.
And the decision made on your wealth building activity in haste is always one you'll regret. It's almost always got unintended consequences that you haven't realized. So many people taking their tax-free cash on the fear the government will limit it is a worrying one because once you've taken your tax-free cash out of your pension, for example, Chris, you don't get a second bite of that cherry. You've taken it. So you could take the tax-free cash now. Say you've got a pot worth 400 grand and you take a hundred grand out.
that money's now gone. It hasn't helped you're in a heritages tax position because it's still in your estate. And you're then left with a decision about what you're going to do with that money. And you could end up just putting it in cash, not doing anything, which therefore doesn't serve any purpose at all, other than this notional fear that the government might stop tax free cash. But they always signpost what's going on. I've never seen anything that doesn't have a degree of signposting.
Speaker 1 (08:42.693)
We've certainly seen that with the inheritance tax April 27. We've seen it with business owners, albeit, I mean, that's not getting any press at all, which is a worrying thing for me as a business owner as well. That if you've got a business that you put your entire energy into, you build your entire life's work around, you create a solid business. And let's assume for the sake of an argument, one of the exit strategies anybody could have, which I don't think was talked about by
Chris Spattling in his book that we did a debrief of in a recent podcast, which talks about the different exit strategies of the business. You maybe signpost that one, Chris, for people who want to sell. But those who want to pass on their business to the next generation, then there's always been up until now anyway, an unlimited valuation. So whatever your business is worth, if you pass it on to the next generation, it's entirely tax free.
Which is great because, if you've got family members who want to carry on the business, then it's been tax free up until now. In April 26, they change it to a maximum of a million tax free and then 50 % tax on the rest, which is 20 % as opposed to 40%. And this is a dry tax, you know, which means you have to pay the tax, but you don't get anything for it. You pass the business on to the next generation. Let's say it's a good business.
and lots of good family businesses around, and we meet them, don't we, on our travels and on our speeches and so on. And they've got good businesses and all of a sudden they've got to pay a whole bunch of tax when previously they would have paid absolutely nothing. And it worries me that the undoing of life's work to me is just unfair. And there are many things that I think are unfair in the current regime. One of those
In addition to that one, which I think is horrific, is the fact that the inheritance tax limit that's been set gives everybody 325 tax free. But that's been held there since 2009. And it'll be held until the end of the parliament, which is, 2029, 2030. You leave for an allowance.
Speaker 1 (11:05.94)
One touch for 20 years is like, was the income tax allowance 20 years ago? It needs to be kept in place with inflation, but it isn't. And the second consequence of that is if you're freezing the allowance, more people are coming into the tax net just accidentally through inflation, through their pension growing a bit more, through their property's worth a bit more. So it's certainly more unfair on those with higher price properties, which obviously there's a North-South.
divide on that one. Worse still, Chris, I'm not sure people have picked up on this, that there is an additional allowance of 175 if you're leaving your property to the next generation, direct descendants, i.e. children or grandchildren. But if you're single or you're not married, you don't get the allowance at all. So could still have children, but because you're not married, it doesn't count. So there just too many uncertainties that are caused by this complexity.
When in my view, and simplistically, if you took the lid off the political power, you took the lid off the manifesto pledges of, won't increase income tax, we won't increase national insurance for workers, but they did for employers, and we'll keep the triple lock. A pragmatic government would look at this and say, look at a macro level, a big picture level, we can't afford this. We got to tell the truth. So instead of finding ways, creative ways to tinker.
get more money from unsuspecting people who then get fearful, they could have done a different job, but they're not doing it. So many of these complexities come up that are really difficult to understand why they exist. So many of them are around tax, multiple tax levels for capital gains tax, Multiple levels of this complexity around whether you're married or not.
Really? Why would you tax people who are unmarried or with no children worse? know, so people with no children penalized for not having kids. It's crazy. So no wonder people are scared because they don't know which way to turn now with the complexity because they've got to work their way through it. But in addition, they don't know what's coming. So I understand the fear. I understand the need to want to knee-jerk, but I would say
Speaker 1 (13:36.376)
Get in a community, find people you trust, wherever that community is, get a sounding board that you can replay your thoughts, let them come back to you, give yourself time to then make an informed decision. Because I've never seen legislation that comes in like that, that should undo some of your planning. There's always some time to consider it. And there so many of these.
that are happening now, Chris. So, you know, we're a great community, but other communities exist as well. And do not take your guidance from Facebook or from ChatGPT. Whatever it says is invariably general and not specific to you. So have conversations, have dialogues, find a buddy, find a guide, find a mentor and have a conversation about things. That's what I would suggest on that.
You mentioned community there. That made me think we had a really nice review that came in just this morning, didn't we, Kevin? So I'm going to read that one out now because John took the time to write this review on Trustpilot and John's been a member only six months or so. So, you know, really pretty early days if we talk about, you know, three to five years for, you know, building up financial security and moving on to independence. And John has said,
I've been with Wealthbuilders for six months and it already may be the most sensible thing I have ever done. I joined Wealthbuilders because I felt slightly trapped in my profitable business because I was struggling to scale it. After six months, I can already see light at the end of the tunnel by building income from assets and not just for hours worked. Wealthbuilders has already given me the confidence with support and sincerity to buy my first investment property and book a viewing to look to buy an office for my business.
Thank you so very much for the progress that we have started with and for the clear plan that I now have ahead of me for the next three years.
Speaker 1 (15:28.696)
That's good. that's, you know, that's difficult. You want to know how difficult that is with a business owner who's running a business. And we know business income is never permanent. It's always temporary. You're trading activity for income instead of building assets for income. And the big challenge for many business owners and John, it's obviously made himself an exception, is almost all business owners put too many of eggs in their business basket. And like my father who died and the business died, no eggs in the basket.
Nothing, you know, so there has to be a change in paradigm for business owners to recognize that if they're building a business, they need to build wealth at the same time as owning that business for a number of reasons. One of those is you can never tell what the economic circumstances are at the time when you want to exit. You can never tell what your health is going to be at the time you want to exit. And there's always a discrepancy. always has been, there always will be.
between the value in individual places on their own business, like a baby, no, but it's got an ugly baby, to the value of the business that's perceived by an acquirer. And that difference is always a source of disappointment. so in my view, and the view of WealthBuilders is, as we meet business owners, we encourage them to keep a separate business in their mind and almost create it, not in reality, but in the sense of a wealth.
business for their family. We call it a family wealth business. And we want to give it a name so it starts to take a life as important as a limited company would so they can start to build their wealth as John is doing. And by building it, they're building increasing independence, an increased foundation of support that if they take three to five years to be, say five years to become financially independent, right, that's pretty much how long it takes for most people.
So if you're financially independent, you're no longer having to sell on somebody else's terms. You're able to sell on your terms. And it takes about five years really to fully exit from a business because you two years of preparation and maybe three years. And in most situations, even if you sell a business, because the buyer is not trusting all the data, they encourage something called an earn out, which means you've got to work in the business for a period of time.
Speaker 1 (17:53.666)
to make sure that the business does what the owner, new owner thinks it's going to do. And what we've definitely seen in many cases, including people we know inside WealthBuilders, is they sell their business, they agree a price, they get the money upfront, but they almost never get the owner. For a number of reasons. One, the owner who's the founder, who was wearing the badge on his or her chest proudly is now suddenly, instead of being an owner, they're now an employee and they hate it.
Or the, the acquirer doesn't do a great job or says you haven't met, you know, didn't meet certain standards. And as a result, they thought they were going to be financially independent from the sale, but they're not because they don't get all the money. Whereas if you're completely financially independent before that, you can afford to make a different choice. You know, you can afford to, as I said, create your own terms and you're not in a position where you're desperate because desperate people as we're seeing.
with this knee jerk reaction, sell for lower prices. That's why landlords are running scared and selling properties at below normal prices. And of course there's an opportunity where that happens for some, as long as there's an ethical exchange both ways. But you know, we see it with business owners more so because they've got more of their eggs. It's not just a landlord selling one property out of 10. It's a business owner selling one business out of one. And that's a dangerous place to be.
The other thing I think is important to share is if a business owner has taken five years, almost in parallel, running in parallel, a plan to be wealthy and a plan to sell the business, then all those decision-making muscles, as John is learning about the pillars, the wealth strategies, the protection strategies, know, tax, legal, financial, structural, a whole bunch of different things that they would start to learn and absorb. When they get
those decision-making muscles flex and strong. If they do get that money from the sale, they know exactly what to do with it. They're not in a position where they've got a chunk of change in the bank account and they've got no clue what to do and now they're running fearful. So they've lost their identity, they've lost their business and they've got money in the bank and they don't know what to do with it. And we have conversations like that with business owners who are in that position. So we do try and encourage, if we can meet them earlier, to
Speaker 1 (20:22.872)
to have that two-strand approach. Build your business to exit if that's what you want, but build your wealth alongside that. And when you're doing that, there's no panic, there's no knee-jerk, there's no reaction. So it's just another thing. So focus on building wealth is my thought because certainty comes from...
recurring income streams, multiple streams of recurring income that come independently. So even though things happen, bad things happen, governments are going to change things, economies are going to change things, these changes can inconvenience you, but they'll never devastate you. so you create certainty by owning assets. So the assets create the income, your activity does not, and your fear never really gets in the way because you're financially bulletproof. You've created essentially
a family wealth fortress that is impenetrable. Yes, it can be dented, but it's absolutely impenetrable if you do it well. And that's the process we try and share for those people who resonate with WealthBuilders. So take something from that, if you will. And that's never going to come out.
You've just answered my question that was going to come next is how do you change from uncertainty to certainty and how do you go from insecurity to security?
to
Speaker 2 (21:43.918)
But you answered it right there. So exactly that, right? It's about assessing where you are. Take stock. That's the first step, isn't it? Look at what you've already got in your life and undoubtedly you probably have some assets which are under-leveraged. And that's where we begin the process with any of our members, isn't it? We take that holistic, big picture view and then we go to work on the assets that are most likely to generate the recurring income in the quickest amount of time and the safest way possible. Yeah.
And the two forms of recurring income that are leaving people's lives, and they're not earning it, they're spending it, is the taxes they pay and the fees they pay. So certainly part of the initial process anybody can do is spend time with someone who can help you understand how you can reduce your income tax, corporation tax, capital gains tax, inheritance tax, and they all interact with each other.
For the most part, you can plan these things. And then secondly, take stock of fees that are leaving your life, like financial institution fees, like the sort of hidden fees of leaving cash, doing nothing, when it could be earning money, you're losing the recurring income from the potential of that. So once you can get your head around doing some basic things right, and what we try and do within where we work with
with people who've got that position is ask them to do one thing a month, isn't it? It's not like huge devastating revolutionary things is do one thing this month that is going to add value. So whether it's, you know, for your business owner and you've got cash in your bank, how do you get the biggest interest on that? If you've got money that you've got lost pensions, you know, find them and consolidate them and bring them together.
so that you've got that transparency and that clarity, and then you can pay attention to the charges. Because when you've got money all over the place, it's easy to lose track of the fees and it's easy to lose track of the performance. And worse still with pensions, it's easy to lose track of the pensions altogether. And as they're going to be subject to inheritance taxes, we know that job's going to fall on the executors. And if you as a person haven't taken the time,
Speaker 1 (24:05.518)
to find, document and record your own pensions, how the hell are the executives going to do that? You know, so another action point I'd say for anybody right now is take a look at your will. Hopefully you've made one. If you haven't, do the hour and get somebody to help you with that, whether it's us or somebody else, it doesn't matter, but get a will done, get your powers of attorney done, collect your pensions, get them in the right place. One of the things I'm creating Chris and be interesting,
to share it with listeners is we're creating a digital vault to allow that record keeping to be done well so that everything is recorded in a secure place. A digital vault, in other words. So all the documents are saved, all the values are saved, all the accesses are saved, all with really high quality security, but allows the next generation or executors a digital key.
unlock that in the event of the worst happening. So lots of things we're doing to try and make the information gathering a once and for all thing, you know, rather than having things all over the place in boxes and files and all sorts of things.
think we've covered a broad spectrum there. And we know headlines will always change, budgets, property cycles, pension rules, but your wealth shouldn't be at the mercy of these new cycles. So watch...
on with these old people then getting themselves in debt?
Speaker 2 (25:31.864)
Well, yeah, it's I think the digital revolution, being able to just tap and click, making it so easy now to delay payments. you know, that's potentially eating into your retirement, your savings, you know, if you're to be delaying payments that should be paid now into three to five years in the future.
also, well, you know, I can see why people might do that, but I'm also seeing more people deciding and being determined. And I think it's a great thing, at least to be aware of that they want to live a life. You know, they've your best years if you've got talking to one gentleman or family rather, and they have six holidays a year and they love them. I'm saying that's amazing. You're living a great life, but you got to fuel that. Where's the fuel going to come from?
And, you know, one of the arguments that we had is just a debating point to have an honest conversation is you could take it out of your pension and pay higher rate tax on it, or you've got a property worth X, a lot, no mortgage on it. You could draw a little bit of money from the bricks and mortar and maybe that money will come back as property values go up. And while I'm not saying it's the right thing or the wrong thing, I'm saying whenever you want to live your life, you can borrow money from yourself and pay yourself back.
You can borrow money from your future self and let the inheritance pay it because, know, in the long term, anything you take on equity release, for example, reduces the value of the estate, so reduces the inheritance tax. And as long as it's done or considered with the knowledge and cooperation of the family and with independent financial and legal advice, could be a very valid thing. And the gentleman came back and said, I'd like to consider that as an alternative.
to spending my pension because he's had his tax-free cash. And the evidence is for people drawing pensions at the minute, is the standard advisory safety net to maintain a pension, why would anybody maintain it now if they don't want to worry about the inheritance tax, was 4 5%. So it should self-replenish to give you a sustainable fund for the very long term.
Speaker 1 (27:42.4)
Often people can spend what, 30 years in retirement even. What we're seeing now is more people drawing more. So they're drawing seven, 8 % now, which means if they get the maths wrong and the stock market collapses, they don't have a recurring income. They just got a value that is not under their control. There's volatility. And as the world becomes more uncertain, wherever you see that uncertainty coming from, Middle East, America, anything can happen. know, the news is full of it.
If the stock market corrects massively at a time when you're drawing income, you're bleeding your own self dry, you're cracking eggs in your nest and chucking the money away. And that's a difficult one for people to balance. So again, it's sensible to get recurring income from many sources so that if you're drawing money from your pension, you're not draining it entirely and you're not going to run out of money before you run out of life. And that would be a tragedy for sure.
So if there's anything that we've discussed today that makes you think, I need to take some action, then please get in touch with us. Head to wealthbuilders.co.uk. You'll see a big red button on the website. It says book a call and we'll have a chat. We'll see how we can help you in the best way possible. Send us a message on the socials. However you wish to get in touch, email hello at wealthbuilders.co.uk. That's it. Build a system of assets that fund your lifestyle and you'll always have control.
Don't panic!
Speaker 1 (29:09.24)
Yeah, and we'll be doing some guides. We've got the Inheritstacks guide coming out. We've got a wait list of that, which is growing massively. I'll also do a guide, Chris, post budget, because that budget's going to be interesting. And, you know, we will want to make sure that people receive that information calmly and with a plan. And we'll try and point out some of those things. And we're going to be getting out in the new year on. sort of points north, south, east and west to meet people in the flesh because these changes are.
quite dramatic. And as I said at the beginning of this episode, Chris, find a community that you resonate with. We're going to be out and about and encouraging people to come and say hello and ask questions to see if they feel comfortable with the integrity and what did he say? John's sincerity that we offer and do check our trust pilot reviews and see what other people are saying about us. You know, it only works for us if it works for you and we know the fear is rife. We want to calm you down.
make you feel you can get where you want to get to faster, safer, and more enjoyably than you're to do. And overwhelm can set in, fear can set in, and that's not enjoyable. let's leave it there. Chris, I think we covered a few of where the fear is coming from different angles, and I'm sure there'll be more of that in the budget, and we'll definitely do a post-budget episode.
Yeah, we will do and we hope you enjoyed today's episode. If you did hit the share button, send it to a friend and why not leave us a comment. Comments popping up now on Spotify, on iTunes, wherever you listen to your podcast, I'm sure you'll be able to leave a review and a comment and we really would appreciate that. And of course, we love reading those out on future episodes. All right, Kevin, we'll be back same time, same place next week.
We will indeed until then my friend. See ya
Speaker 1 (30:59.726)
We hope you enjoy today's episode. Don't forget that we are constantly updating our resources inside the WealthBuilders membership site to help you create, build and protect your wealth. Head over to wealthbuilders.co.uk slash membership right now for free access. That's wealthbuilders.co.uk slash membership.