Hey Cash Kids! Let me ask you a big question... What if I told you that you could be a millionaire one day just by saving a little bit of money each year starting NOW — even as a teen? In this episode, we’re talking to Adam Bergman, a retirement expert who’s helped over 17,000 people invest using self-directed IRAs — including his own kids! He’s going to break down how YOU can start investing in things like Bitcoin, real estate, and even small businesses... yes, even as a teen. We’ll talk about: ✅ The secret power of Roth IRAs ✅ How compounding returns make your money grow faster ✅ Why starting early gives YOU the biggest advantage So if you're serious about building real wealth and taking control of your financial future — you do NOT want to miss this. Before we dive in — don’t forget to like, subscribe, and leave us a review if you're loving the podcast. Your support helps us reach more future millionaires just like you! Alright, let’s get into it. (intro tease) Cash Kid: Hey Cash kids. Welcome back to the Cash Kid Podcast and today we're doing an interview with none other than the Adam Bergman . He's the founder of IRA Financial Group And IRA Financial Trust, which are the leading providers of self-directed IRA plans and 4 0 1 Ks. He's helped over 17,000 clients make alternative asset investments with their self-directed plans. Adam has published nine books on retirement plans and Taxation is a frequent contributor to Forbes and has been quoted in over 250 major publications. He's passionate about educating Americans of self-directed investment plans and passionate about my generation and learning about these types of investment strategies earlier in life. I'm excited to learn from Adam today. So hey Adam. Welcome to the show, and first off, tell us a little bit about yourself. Adam Bergman: Well thanks so much for having me. Really excited. So I was a tax lawyer and um, for eight years in New York City. Really, um, always wanted to be an entrepreneur. Didn't really know what I wanted to do. And I had the pleasure of being able to help a client who wanted to use his IRA to invest in what's called a hedge fund. Right? It's, a more advanced way to invest. So I was asked to research how he was, able to use his IRA to invest in a hedge fund, and I was totally blown away because. I couldn't imagine myself, always thought of myself as a really, you know, smart guy. I was a tax lawyer of a master's in tax law and I had no idea that you can use your IRA to do alternative assets like real estate or gold or hedge fund. So I quit my job and started IRA Financial about 15 years ago. Cash Kid: you have adults save retirement and really like unique ways. So can you explain just like what a self-directed plan is, but in a way that a kid or teen could understand it? Adam Bergman: Sure, sure. So I'll, let me double click on that and just give a little bit of history and make it easier to understand. So in 1974, IRAs were created Not a lot of Americans got to save for retirement. Right. It was mostly if you worked at big companies like Ford or GE, you had a defined benefit plan, otherwise you just didn't have a chance. So the government created ERISA, which created the IRA and the 401k, which are the two most common ways to save. So what is the foundation? What's an IRA or an individual retirement account? Basically anyone that has some income that works, that has a job, could open an IRA. So you can be a lifeguard, you can be a basketball coach, you can work at the grocery store. You can do chores for a neighbor, as long as it's really not a parent paying you. You can have income and you can put money into an IRA. And what's the advantage? Well, there's two big advantages. One is you get a tax deduction for what you put in. Meaning if you make $20,000 and you get a $5,000 tax deduction, you only pay tax on 15,000, which is good. It's less money goes to the government. And the second is the most important. It's called tax deferral. That means you don't pay tax when your money is invested in an IRA. So here's a simple example. If you take a hundred dollars and buy Bitcoin, okay, or or Tesla stock, and it goes to $200 in an IRA and you sell it, you don't pay any tax. If you did that in a non IRA account, you would pay income tax on that gain. And if you did that for the next 10, 15, 20, 30 years, you're gonna have a lot, lot less money if you saved in a non IRA. Cash Kid: Right. Yeah. And I feel like that's a big factor, and that's part of one of the reasons that we really wanted this interview is so we could teach people the different, like investment strategies or different ways that you could invest through different platforms. And so being able to show like the unique benefits, I think would be really beneficial for us at our age. So thank you. And, uh, third of all, why do you think it's important for people even young people like us to start thinking about money for the future now instead of waiting till we're adults. Adam Bergman: Yeah, so being young, you have the biggest advantage. I have a 14-year-old and 11-year-old, and they both have Roth ira, so lemme just. Discuss that real quick. So I talked about the traditional IRA where you get a tax deduction. There's something called a Roth IRA, which is an after tax IRA, meaning you do not get a tax deduction, but once you're 59 and a half and the Roth's been open at least five years, you pull out everything tax-free. You never, ever, ever, ever have to pay income tax again on what you save. So here's an example. I like to give examples because I think they make the most sense. So let's take an easy example. How about someone's 15 years old? Okay. And let's say they have a job at the grocery store, and let's say they wanna save a thousand dollars a summer, right? They're gonna spend some money and do some stuff with it. But let's say they just wanna put away a thousand dollars a summer, which is possible, and let's just say for argument's sakes, that from age 15 to 70 years old, okay? So even if they go to college and make more money, the individual just puts away a thousand dollars a year. Starting from 15 to age 70, and let's just say they get an average rate of return of 8.5%, which is pretty good, but not great considering. If you look at like the S&P 500, the largest index in the stock market, it averages over 10%. So if you did that 15 to 70 a thousand dollars a year, eight point a half percent rate of return at age 70, you'd have a million dollars. Okay, so here's how about this, instead of 15, let's say you started at 25. Okay? Instead of 15 years old and you started 25 a thousand dollars, guess what? You only have $450,000. So this is so important. That's why I'm so excited to be on this podcast. If you are young, you have the biggest advantage, and that's time. And the way the retirement system works is the more money you put in and the more time you have, the richer you become. Cash Kid: Yeah, and I think that's one of like one of our main like factors and things that we're trying to get people to do. So I, at my school, I was given the opportunity to give a presentation, so I made a financial presentation about how to make money and what to do with it, and in it, I really hit on the like big impact that, uh, starting early is like one of the biggest benefits you could possibly have because I did the same example I said if you started at 16 and then you started at 26 and the difference is basically almost half as you just explained. And so it really just shows like the important and beneficial factor of starting early. And that's why we like to say it's never too early to start. So what's the difference between regular investing and alternative investing, and could you give us another fun example? Adam Bergman: Yeah, absolutely. So. When IRAs were created back in 1974, the, the IRS did not distinguish between an IRA that bought stocks, which is traditional investment, anything that's publicly traded, right, like stocks or exchange traded funds, mutual funds, and then alternative assets, which are non-publicly traded, like real estate, uh, gold, hedge funds, private equity, private businesses, lending your friend money. Even Bitcoin is considered an alternative. So it's, it's anything not traded on a public exchange, anything that's not a stock. Cash Kid: So basically, uh, you just, instead of traditionally buying a stock, you'd set it into like maybe a Bitcoin or like a house that's just like not as like publicly traded, is what you're saying. Adam Bergman: Exactly. it's exactly right. So the reason why the government wants us to invest not just in stocks, but in real estate or Bitcoin or gold or private businesses, is because they want us to diversify, right? The idea is that if you put all your eggs in one basket and something happens to the stock market, you don't just lose 30% of your net worth in one day, which has happened. So like for me, my best investments I ever made and my kids as well, was Bitcoin. I got into Bitcoin over 10 years ago. I started buying Bitcoin for my kids five years ago and that has far exceeded anything they've been able to generate in the stock market. So if they just stuck with stocks, they would've done fine, but they would've missed out on a lot of opportunity. Cash Kid: Yeah. Yeah. And I feel like that's like really true about a ton of things. 'cause I mean then again, like real estate prices are constantly going up. And so when I was first like looking into you and like thinking about other stuff, I really saw how it was just like another way to diversify. 'cause when I talk, I always talk about diversifying in your stocks. But then again, talking about this alternative investing, you can really diversify int
