HS 136 – The Financial Survival Network with Kerry Lutz

Kerry Lutz is the Host of The Financial Survival Network. He joins Jason to discuss what the Financial Survival Network (FSN) is and why he started it. He also shares some tips on how to survive financially. Lutz has been a student of  Austrian Economics since 1977. While attending Pace University, he stumbled upon an extensive cache of Austrian Economic Literature in a dark, musty, abandoned section of the school’s library. After graduating from The New York Law School,  he became an attorney and life long serial entrepreneur. His diverse career  has included: running a legal printing company, practicing commercial law and litigation and founding a successful distressed asset investment company.

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After the 2008 financial collapse and the continued global economic deterioration, Kerry realized people needed a reliable source for accurate information. Believing that inflation would eventually run rampant, he dedicated himself to helping people protect and preserve their wealth. He urged investors to re-balance their investment portfolios and to implement precious metals based strategies to adapt to the new economic order. The ability to perceive economic reality, as well as to separate truth from governmental inspired economic fantasy will be essential for economic survival and prosperity in the years ahead.

In  2010, Kerry gave up most of his other interests to pursue his long held desire of becoming a radio show host. Thus the Financial Survival Network was born. Its mission is helping you to survive and thrive in the New Economy. He has done hundreds of interviews with such financial luminaries as Peter Schiff, Harry S. Dent, Martin Armstrong and Peter Grandich. Kerry now appears on 1490 WGCH, in Greenwich, CT, every Tuesday from 11am-12pm EST. In addition,  he is continually releasing new segments and interviews on iTunes, Libsyn podcasters and YouTube.

His new Triple Lutz Report was an instant hit and continues to increase audience share.

The Financial Survival Network is a nationwide alliance of investment professionals with a common objective: delivering the timely truth about sound financial investments over local radio stations. We bring hard-working and ethical professionals in the country together to provide the media and forum necessary for local investors to learn about all the important aspects of financial life, especially inflation protected investments.

The Financial Survival Network® brings you a “live and local” show hosted by well-respected investment and financial professionals who want to educate you on building your financial fortress.

Visit the Financial Survivor Network at www.financialsurvivalnetwork.com.

Check out this episode

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Narrator: Welcome to the Holistic Survival Show with Jason Hartman. The economic storm brewing around the world is set to spill into all aspects of our lives. Are you prepared? Where are you going to turn for the critical life skills necessary for you to survive and prosper? The Holistic Survival Show is your family’s insurance for a better life. Jason will teach you to think independently, to understand threats and how to create the ultimate action plan. Sudden change or worst case scenario, you’ll be ready. Welcome to Holistic Survival, your key resource for protecting the people, places and profits you care about in uncertain times. Ladies and gentlemen, your host, Jason Hartman.

Jason Hartman: Welcome to the Holistic Survival Show. This is your host Jason Hartman, where we talk about protecting the people places and profits you care about in these uncertain times. We have a great interview for you today. And we will be back with that in less than 60 seconds on the Holistic Survival Show. And by the way, be sure to visit our website at HolisticSurvival.com. You can subscribe to our blog, which is totally free, has loads of great information, and there’s just a lot of good content for you on the site, so make sure you take advantage of that at HolisticSurvival.com. We’ll be right back.

Start of Interview with Kerry Lutz

Jason Hartman: Hey, it’s my pleasure to welcome my friend Kerry Lutz to the show. He is the founder and host of the financial survival network. And he just covers a lot of great, fascinating topics on his show and has some fascinating guests and thought leaders on his show as well. And he’s coming to us today from somewhere in Florida. Kerry, how are you doing?

Kerry Lutz: Doing great Jason. And thanks so much for having me on the show.

Jason Hartman: The pleasure is all mine. Hey, I have to ask you, where in Florida are you located? I don’t remember.

Kerry Lutz: I’m in Northern Palm Beach County, a little town called Jupiter of 55 thousand people, right off the ocean. And we’re having cold weather now. It’s 64 degrees.

Jason Hartman: Now Kerry, there’s Jupiter island, right? And is there Jupiter that’s not the island too?

Kerry Lutz: Yeah, Tiger Woods actually lives on Jupiter Isle. And there’s the Jupiter Inlet over there, there’s a distinctive light house. But I’m further west. I didn’t really want to be that close to the ocean because Florida hurricanes. Hurricane Alley here… and why tempt fate?

Jason Hartman: Sure. Why tempt fate? But yeah, Jupiter, that’s a high end area in Florida from what I understand. I haven’t been there, but I’ve got to go check it out, So first of all, let’s get a little background if we can Kerry. When did you start The Financial Survival Network?

Kerry Lutz: I started it back in 2011. Actually I started radio back in 2010, got into The Financial Survival Network shortly thereafter. After the financial crash I realized that you really needed to get good information that you weren’t getting from the mainstream, and certainly not from the government.

Jason Hartman: Yeah. No question about it. The mainstream media, or as Sarah Palin adequately called it I think, the Lame Stream media. It’s all corporatized. It’s all the same dribble. It’s the same six top stories. You just don’t get the full picture of what is going on out there, especially if you’re watching television. And I call television the idiot’s medium. Talk radio is better because it’s more in depth, but television is just wow. Very little of it is good. There’s some good stuff there, but not much.

Kerry Lutz: Yeah. Not much. It reminds me of that old saying, television reminds me of the old saying by H.L. Mencken, “No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public”

Jason Hartman: Yeah you could short American intelligence and you’d do very well, right? Sort of like you short a stock. So The Financial Survival Network is basically a podcast right?

Kerry Lutz: Correct. We’re on terrestrial radio too, but most people, most of you out there hear us on the internet.

Jason Hartman: And tell us about some of the guests you’ve had on the show.

Kerry Lutz: Well, hey. Just today I had Martin Armstrong on, and you’ll like this, he said, “Buy real estate. It’s a great play on the dollar and on the economy effectively.” And we used to have the late great Bob Chapman on. He was a regular guest. We get Chris Duane in the Silver Shield. We get all sorts of really famous people who I would never think would give me the time of day, but somehow they want the word to get out. Guys like David Morgan, just a whole plethora of guests.

And we don’t let up. We just keep doing more and more and more every single day, and you never know who’s going to be on here. Mickey Fulp, John Rubino at DollarCollapse.com, Tom Dyson at Palm Beach Letter, G Edward Griffin, I know he’s been on your show, Charles Hugh Smith… the list just goes on and on. And we’re trying to give you as much information as we can so that you will be prepared and able to deal with the emerging economic realities in the US and in the world.

Jason Hartman: And they are changing quickly, folks. Kerry I have called this many times and I think others have to: the largest transfer of wealth in human history. That is what is facing us right now, and some people, those in the know, those who are paying attention, and not only paying attention but acting on what they know… you’ve got to take action. You can’t just listen and learn. Life is a do it yourself project and without action nothing happens. But this is a historic time. And some will be enriched by it, and some will be impoverished by it. I’d like to ask you, and of course all of your guests have different opinions, and all of my guests on my shows have different opinions and different views and a different take on things, but if you had to pick maybe one or a few overriding themes, Kerry, as to kind of what the gist is of what your guests are saying, could you share some of those with us?

Kerry Lutz: Sure. Glad to. And what they say, there’s two camps. Maybe there’s three. There’s ones who say we’re going to have hyperinflation, and therefor if you’re a debtor, that’s the best of all possible worlds, unless they change the rules. And then there are those who say we’re going to have deflation, meaning that the value of the dollar is going to go way, way up. And if you have debt you’re going to be crushed. And then there are the people who say that it’s more or less going to continue on this way until certain events happen and nobody can really judge when they’re going to happen. And at that point, they either fall into the deflation or the hyperinflation camp.

But the point is, it’s happening kind of in slow motion because of the money printing, because of the debasement of every currency in the world, and therefor like you said, this is the greatest wealth transfer, greatest opportunity you’re ever going to have to build real wealth. And all you have to do Jason, and you know this, I’m sure you’ve quoted it, but during the great depression more millionaires were made in the United States than at any other time in history. Think about what that means and what it means to you now.

Jason Hartman: Yep. No question about it. That’s when the opportunities arise but unfortunately most people miss it, don’t they?

Kerry Lutz: Well, because look there’s a lot of fear, and you can’t allow fear to be your master. You can’t suppress it. You kind of have to come to an arrangement with it, use it to help make you smarter, but not to control your actions. Fear of the unknown is not an excuse to sit back in your chair and do nothing. You have to come up with a strategy, you’ve got to get the knowledge, and you’ve got to learn the strategies, a lot of which you teach, of how to build lasting wealth. And there’s a lot of ways of doing it, whether it be real estate, precious metals, insurance policies, certain stocks that are going to be there no matter what – you have a lot of alternatives available, and probably the best strategy is a combination of them.

Jason Hartman: I thought one of the things you were going to say to answer my big sort of overriding question there was that all of your guests, and now that I’m jogging your memory here I bet you are going to agree with this or your guests are, but they probably all think a lot of inflation is coming I assume.

Kerry Lutz: Yeah. I’m sorry but yeah. Basically even the people that believe eventually we’re going to go into a severe protracted deflation believe there will be inflation along the way, and most of my guests, if not all, all agree that the current rate of inflation and the increase in consumer prices which are two separate matters, are far greater than is stated in the official statistics. Which means that you really can’t wait around for inflation. It’s here now. You’ve got to accept it. I don’t know when the last time was that you filled up your car Jason, but yesterday I filled my car up with a noninflationary $65 worth of gasoline.

Jason Hartman: Yeah and your pun there is of course they take food and energy out of the core weight index.

Kerry Lutz: Yeah. And all I could say is I’m happy there’s no inflation, because if there was I might have paid $100 for that tank of gas if we really had inflation. So yeah, inflation definitely. And that’s why you need to own hard things of value.

Jason Hartman: That’s what I say Kerry. Money doesn’t really matter that much. Or I should say currency, not money, but currency, the symbol of real money. Because money is things. Things actually do matter. Commodities, things that have universal need, that people need to live their lives, to manufacture food clothing and shelter, the three basic human needs and then the needs beyond that. So hard assets are where it’s at, not paper assets, right?

Kerry Lutz: I couldn’t agree more. Really, when you’ve got a depreciating currency – which every man, woman and child on the planet does now – there’s no currency out there that’s going up in purchasing power. When you have that, the key is not to have it to hold your wealth and that’s appreciating currency is to own things and there’s a lot of things that you can own that will go up in value or at least in nominal depreciating currency, in dollars effectively. And that could very well be a lot of different asset classes, resources, real estate, you name it.

Jason Hartman: Let me take a brief pause. We’ll be back in just a minute.

Narrator: Have you listened to the Creating Wealth series? I mean from the beginning. If not, you can go head and get book one, that’s shows 1-20, in digital download. These are advanced strategies for wealth creation. For more information go to JasonHartman.com.

Jason Hartman: Well there’s no definition for hyperinflation. No academic definition. And I ask my guests this a lot of times on my shows. But any opinions from your guests or you on how much inflation we’ll have, when it will hit, I’m looking for a percentage number here. Nobody knows – of course it’s a prediction. But when you look at even an inflation rate of 100% annually compared to some other countries and times throughout history, that’s pretty mild believe it or not. Is that even considered hyperinflation?

Kerry Lutz: Well, technically. Technically the definition is, I’ve heard offered by some economists (and I’ve had a number of pretty mainstream economists on the show), 20% or 2%-3% a month is pretty much considered hyperinflation. You’ve got to look at shadowstats.com…

Jason Hartman: Yeah we had John Williams on our show. He’s great.

Kerry Lutz: Yeah and look at his stats. He says we have 5-6% inflation now – he sees it going up higher. And the governments are all about fooling you and not letting you know when this inflation hits, because they don’t want to do anything that will undermine confidence in the so-called recovery. So can’t say exactly when it’s going to happen, but it will happen because the fed is just buying bonds from the banks at par. And what are the banks doing with that money? Well, to some extent they’re buying new treasury offerings to take place, but they’re going to have to loan it at some point, it’s going to find its way into the money supply, period. And maybe it’s finding its way right now in real estate and we’re seeing the first signs of inflation in the real estate market. The bubble is getting blown again.

Jason Hartman: And I think that already happened back in 2008 with the stock market. As soon as the Obama got in office, the printing press just went into overdrive of course, and we had the bail outs and the money creation out of thin air, and just amazing levels of money creation. And it pumped up the stock market. And the stock market came back. Most people thought that was… I always argued that wasn’t a real dollar increase in the Dow, it was a nominal dollar increase. Because if you take into account the amount of money that was created, was any ground really gained?

Kerry Lutz: No, it just put off the inevitable. Because there’s going to have to be an economic reset globally that takes place and whether that means the dollar is no longer the reserve currency or we go back on some type of metallic standard – I don’t know what it’s going to be. I don’t know when it’s going to be. Sooner rather than later. It is going to happen because the current system is unsustainable, because we’re not paying any debt down. We’re just paying interest on interest.

Jason Hartman: Right and borrowing 46 cents of every dollar to do our silly spending. It’s just crazy.

Kerry Lutz: Yeah, and next year they’re saying, or this year I think, the fed will buy 90% of all the treasuries new offerings. That just can’t go on. That is a prescription for disaster. You need to be preparing now.

Jason Hartman: What are some of the tips on preparation? You alluded to them, but maybe just elaborate on that a little bit.

Kerry Lutz: Well, without sounding like an ultra-prepper, I think, my personal predilection is you need to be owning some precious metals. I don’t want to say you should go all in on them. I don’t think that’s ever a wise move to go all in on any asset class, because things don’t go the way you’re thinking. Who knows? The future is always uncertain. You could get broken that way. And then I think you need to have some personal preparations in your home in case there’s some supply disruptions. And that means whether there’s an economic collapse or a natural disaster, you should always be prepared at home with your family and your neighbors if you can.

And then of course I think that real estate, more so than I felt in the past, really plays a role in this, especially residential. If you can own your home cheaper than you can rent it, and investment because I believe that in the end of the day, it’s a put on the dollar. You’re basically saying that when you take out a mortgage, you finance some commercial real estate, you’re going to see that your returns are going to be way out there if there’s inflation because you get to pay back your debt in cheaper dollars. There’s hyperinflation.

We don’t know how that’s going to wind up, what type of reset they’re going to do, but the odds are if you’re a real estate professional, it affords you so many advantages in terms of our work-tax system if that’s something you need to be thinking about. Because people need a place to live, businesses need a place to stay, and there’s better real estate markets in certain places in the country but it just seems to make a lot of sense to me. Even though I’ve been down until recently on real estate, I just see it now as this is the time to get in, especially if you can get positive cash flow property without working over too much equity.

Jason Hartman: You’re certainly going to get agreement from me. The great thing about income property is that it’s a multidimensional asset class. So it’s not just about appreciation or depreciation, although appreciation is obviously happening in most markets now. And knowing that all real estate is local, so it depends where, of course. And there are great opportunities. The preamble to the National Association of Realtors, their preamble for their initiation when they induct new members, their induction ceremony is “Under all is land”. Cellphone towers go on land, houses go on land, businesses go on land, everything goes on land.

I interviewed one politician on one of my shows once Kerry, and I remember what he said, it was really bright. He was kind of a, and I don’t mean this is a condescending way, but he was kind of a simple guy. And he said that himself so I’m not saying anything negative, but he said, “I just believe that all value comes from land.” If you think about it, that’s where all of our natural resources come from, whether it be oil, gas, gold, silver, agriculture, real estate. And fake value comes from engineered financial products that are created out of thin air on Wall St. just like fiat money is created out of thin air at the federal reserve in the treasury department.

Kerry Lutz: Yeah. Definitely indispensable . you’ve got to have your piece of earth some place. You’ve got to have a place to stay, place to live, and if you can live and work in the same place, that’s great. Otherwise you’re going to have to work someplace else. It’s a pretty basic need to modern life.

Jason Hartman: It sure is. Well, hey, tell us a little bit more about your show or any of your guests, any other things that you want to say about it. First of all, give out the website if you would.

Kerry Lutz: Oh sure. It’s FinancialSurvivalNetwork.com and on our blog, which is an aggregation. I have this guy who’s my web master, Stephan the human aggregator. And he pulls content articles, he’ll pull articles that you can read from literally, you’ll look at his desktop, he’s got over 70 windows open at any given time.

Jason Hartman: And I thought I was bad. People criticize me for having 30 windows open at a time.

Kerry Lutz: Well, this guy, man. He just keeps it going all day long. We get tens of thousands of people come into the site every single month just to check out the offerings, because it’s kind of a one stop shopping where you can go and see what else is going on in the world, and listen to some of the podcasts if you like, some of the radio shows that we’ve done, and hopefully you’ll get informed and it’ll get you thinking, and you’ll realize that you need to start thinking about what you’re going to do, how you’re going to prepare for the future. Because as long as you have a plan, you’re going to be so much better off than not having a plan. Because if you don’t have a plan, like they say, if you don’t plan to succeed, then you’re planning to fail. And everything in life really starts with a plan.

So that’s what we’re hoping to get you to do, which is why we’ve got a number of different reports: the financial survival toolkit, the precious metals storage report, and how to buy silver at below spot, a lot of different things available there. That’s why I encourage you to go sign up. And Jason, like the best things in life, it’s all free. No charge for anything, and also I wrote a book called Forget Wall St. Go for the Gold and Silver, which is also available on the site, which you might find somewhat informative if you’re not familiar with monetary history throughout civilization.

Jason Hartman: Yeah, fantastic. A couple comments on what you just said about making a plan first of all Kerry. Another way to look at that is everybody has, well not everybody but those who are sort of higher up on the socioeconomic ladder, and especially those that are kind of running the world, they have a plan too. And their plan is not going to be good for you. So I say, if you don’t have a plan you’re going to fit into somebody else’s plan. And you’re not going to like their plans for you as much as your own plans, so make your plan and stick to it. That’s first of all, just a dove tail on what you said.

And then how you said your stuff is free. You’ve got all this great free content out there. And I ran across a very interesting quote I thought was kind of snarky and funny on Facebook recently, and it was by Coco Chanel. And she said, “The best things in life are free. The second best things are very expensive.”

Kerry Lutz: And that reminds me of another funny quote that I heard, which is “Money can’t buy happiness, but it’ll do until the real thing comes along.”

Jason Hartman: I love it. That’s great. That’s for sure. And another one like that is, “Money won’t solve all your problems but at least you can writhe in style to the problems you still have.”

Kerry Lutz: Yeah that is a great point. It’s not everything in life but you do need it. It is a need that humanity has, and if you want to maintain not even a flashy or super lifestyle, but just a survival lifestyle, you need a certain amount of money. And you can cut down on your need for it, but you still need some. So you have to have ways of getting income streams, and certainly a piece of real estate is great, investing in yourself, learning skills.

One thing is, you go in and you see these people in Walmart and elderly people as greeters and you think, my how terrible. But actually, maybe it isn’t so terrible because they figured out another way to pull in another income stream so they don’t have to just rely upon their social security. And it is a proven fact that the longer you work in life, the more active your mind stays and the younger your mind is, so I’ve taken a different view of the people. I used to feel bad when I’d see elderly people working, but honestly it could be the best thing for them.

Jason Hartman: It’s a life extension thing. It is. You really have got to stay engaged. The people that live the longest are the people that die in the middle of a project. They’re just always caught up in something that they’re doing. And they live longer. People that don’t have a purpose don’t live too long. You’re absolutely right. Well, good advice. Kerry, any parting thoughts for our listeners?

Kerry Lutz: Hey, just be ready. Don’t fear the future, don’t fear change, just be ready for change and learn how to profit from change which is something you do so well, Jason. You prepare people to prosper and to profit from change. And if you can understand possible future trends and prepare yourself for them, you’ll be able to do the same.

Jason Hartman: No question about it. Kerry, I used to say that I was an optimist. And I’m not longer an optimist. The whole world seems so much messed up now, but I’m an opportunist and there are a lot of opportunities out there. So keep doing your good work. That’s what your show does and my shows do, and I’m so pleased that we’re both in the positive to get the word out there and help spread the word about the things people don’t hear about in the mainstream media. So keep up the good work Kerry. Thanks.

Kerry Lutz: Hey, you too Jason. Thanks for having me on. I really appreciate it.

Narrator: Thank you for joining us today for the Holistic Survival Show, protecting the people, places and profits you care about in uncertain times. Be sure to listen to our Creating Wealth Show, which focuses on exploiting the financial and wealth creation opportunities in today’s economy. Learn more at www.JasonHartman.com or search “Jason Hartman” on iTunes. This show is produced by the Hartman Media Company, offering very general guidelines and information. Opinions of guests are their own, and none of the content should be considered individual advice. If you require personalized advice, please consult an appropriate professional. Information deemed reliable, but not guaranteed.

Transcribed by Ralph

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