I grew up watching my dad invest in various businesses. He was a hard-working ER doctor (retired this year!) but always was, and is, an entrepreneur at heart.
He invested in start-ups and businesses, mostly medical-related, and he loved talking about them: a medical ID bracelet that popped out accordion-style to fit more information, some rental houseboats on a lake resort, and a chain of medical clinics in the fronts of big grocery stores, like you see with banks or Starbucks now.
He was pumped about all of them. When my dad was driving us late at night, like on a road trip, my mom would say, “Ask him about his *insert latest investment*,” knowing that would keep him awake.
Needless to say, even though these were all legit ventures, they mostly fizzled out.
There were some home runs, though. He bought Bitcoin in 2011 (it came out in 2008) from a vending machine in Vancouver for $200. “Shoulda bought more,” he says, famous last words after every great investment. He reads this, by the way. HI DAD!
Doctors are notoriously bad investors. My dad told me straight up, if you’re ever in a sales or investment presentation, and it’s all doctors, RUN.
Doctors earn big but are usually independent contractors with no pensions or 401ks. They need to invest, but with no time or energy, they throw their money hither and thither.
It’s worse now. The burnout is double, and the money isn’t what it used to be. Medicine is like being an airline pilot: there’s leftover social prestige that pulls people (or their parents) in, but they quickly find it’s a real grind. We could talk about “The Pitt” here, for sure.
Anyway, I was thinking of my dear old dad because we are helping a doctor buy a house, and I was Googling around for a “physician loan”, where doctors can get a preferred rate, and the lender ignores their student loans.
But I got totally distracted after stumbling upon something I had never heard of and never knew existed that my dad would have loved: an entire world of financial freedom for doctors.
We are talking gurus, blogs, subreddits, etc., all about doctors investing, mostly in real estate, with an eye toward financial freedom.
The names are great: Passive Income MD, PhysicianFIRE, The White Coat Investor, etc.
As long-time readers know, I love this stuff, and my dad would have eaten it up back in the day. What a shame it wasn’t all around when he tried to get his financial footing.
There was so little financial education back then. I mean, it was before the internet, so the world was a barren wasteland. Unless you met a guy, or saw an infomercial (Carlton Sheets’ No Money Down), you didn’t know anything.
If you wanted to invest, you had to attend an investment presentation. By the way, I don’t care who is in the audience—doctors or not—never invest in anything where there is a presentation.
My dad never really wanted to be rich. He drove the same rusty car for 15 years that he purchased from a fellow resident for $1. We called it the Toyota Corroded. He was just interested in business/finance. And this sense of financial curiosity has rubbed off on all his kids, including me, in various ways.
By financial curiosity, I mean if you have a lucrative job that no one has heard of, or you own something totally unglamorous, like a bunch of warehouses, my dad will corner you at a party and want to know every detail. I have the same disease.
My dad always talked openly about his money adventures and enjoyed them. This has really benefited me. How other people invest, how they’re saving on taxes, how they have risen to or fallen from financial grace. It’s all fascinating. It’s all education.
