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Steve Ulman is our guest this week on Winning with Winans · Winning With Winans!

• speaker-0: Well I guess it's another time for an episode of Winning with Winens. Let's go. And welcome to Winning with Winens, Las Vegas' newest and coolest financial show. I'm your host, Ken Winins. And for those of you who still do not know me as the finance guy with the cowboy hat, I have been a nationwide financial commentator on radio and in Forbes magazine for the last 25 years, but most important. I walk the talk when it comes to investing. I founded a successful investment management firm in 1992. And today, Wine is Investments is the only Morningstar top-drank money management firm based in Las Vegas. Or as I say in poker to my competitors, read it and weep. Anyway, over the next hour, we're going to be covering a lot of the current events that that really will affect your money. And we will have special guests talk about things that are going on in the Las Vegas Valley. Now, I, if you're going to be in my line of work, you've got to be a news junkie. I literally go through nine different financial sources for to give me the complete picture that I need each and every week to make some decisions. The benefit to you is you don't have to go through all nine. I can give you the big picture overview of stocks, bonds, real estate, commodities, and even cryptocurrencies. Now, winning with one is is truly different in that manner. While mainstream media covers day-to-day happenings in the financial markets, our weekly show tries to connect the dots. So let's get started. So look, this last week, big news Federal Reserve left interest rates unchanged. I know there's a lot of people out there hoping rates are going to come down. In a weird way, I don't want them to, because if they do, that means the economy is not doing well. So it's all relative to what you think. But you know what? Here's the other thing, folks. I'm old enough to remember. When mortgage rates were much, much higher than they are today, or credit card rates were higher, or commercial loans, or any of that stuff. We have a tug of war going on right now between inflation and growth. And our new Fed chairman, Kevin Walsh, he still has that big job of shrinking the Fed's seven trillion dollars worth of debt that they had to absorb really since 2000 when we had the dot-com bubble. The 2008, 2009 Great Recession, and then of course the COVID mess. So you have all that going on, but the the Fed is doing its job, ⁓ and it's time that we have to do something about it. I personally don't think rates are gonna change at all for the rest of the year. I'll go on record for saying that. I think they're gonna be right where they are. Now, the other big news that came out this week was new home prices and sales were reported for the mid year. Now, this is where it gets interesting. If you're looking at just, and I'm talking about, in my case, I look at the Wynans Real Estate Index that you can find on Bloomberg or on Morningstar's databases. It measures, really, it measures home prices going back to the 1800s. But most important, it looks at what's going on now. It does show overall weakness, but if you were to break it down, it's a very mixed picture regionally. And I keep many times talking about blue states and red states, but let's go through the numbers. In New England, okay, and that includes a lot of the states where there's migration taxpayers leaving those states, such as New York, such as Massachusetts. Prices are down 12%. Now, admittedly, I'll tell you that that happens to be a very volatile area. That mum that number might be re ⁓ revised next month. But also in the West, now remember the West includes all the coastal states. It also includes Arizona, Nevada, Utah, and I think it also includes Idaho. That's actually down 3%. Again, more evidence of how this migration is beginning to affect real estate. Ironically, the Midwest was up four and the South was even. So even in spite of all that's going on, you know, they always say about real estate is location, location, location. Well, we're seeing the geographic effects of all this migration that we've been reading about so much. Obviously, the big thing that I'm worried about. the most are earnings. And you know what? So far, so good. And you know what? You're hearing a lot about how it's just a tech driven rally, that nothing else is moving. That is nonsense. That is simply not true. ⁓ financial stocks, which largely just cleared all their earnings. I'm talking about banks, insurance companies, money management firms, all those kinds of things, credit card companies, all of them. They're up, you know, stocks are up 10% year to date. Healthcare ⁓ which includes a lot of companies that actually were having some issue. They're up nine. This is the shocker to me, folks. Retail in restaurants. Now, if you follow the narrative about inflation and people don't have money to spend, look, I don't know about you. I'm having a tough time trying to get into a restaurant in Las Vegas right now. Very, very hard to do. Those stocks are up 16%. Service-based companies are up 24%. And that's with all the talk about AI taking away people's jobs. You know, it is true that tech has been very volatile this year, but I actually break tech from into the new tech and the old tech and electronics. Hey, the the old tech companies, those old boring companies, you know, things like Intel, ⁓ you know, even I'm gonna throw Microsoft and Apple in there. They've had a good year this year. Those stocks have all been trading over 40 years, ⁓ publicly traded on the stock market. Where, you know, tech and electronics are up about 48%, believe it or not. Industry's up 23. Energy, no big surprises up 27. ⁓ you know, the other big surprise to me is that you have utilities, which again, they're doing a lot of revitalization right now on the grid, a lot of talk about nuclear power, a lot of talk about AI data centers. And obviously, real estate stocks themselves were actually up. And just to give you some evidence of this, these are just some headlines. You know, ⁓ big lenders weighed back into commercial real estate. Barron's Financial Weekly. Global building boom. So again, when you're talking about real estate, what are we talking about? Clearly, the higher levels of borrowing rates are not affecting a lot of those companies. Now, there's something that some of the audience has been asking me about. I want to go back and clarify it. It has to do with market seasonality. Now, I brought it up on a couple of shows, and I certainly bring it up on my radio shows. And yes, there is truth that the basic June To September timeframe since 1970, that the markets typically just kind of vacillate on average per month right around zero. They really don't go anywhere. And it is true that from October to the following May of the next year, the market on average is up 2% a month. Now, folks, it does not mean go out and sell all your stocks in the summertime. What it does mean, and I think it's just more of what's going on right now, a good summertime route or strategy, especially now that we're having earnings season. Very simple, sell your losers. If you have companies that have not participated in this rally, or for that matter, let's say you bought near the top in gold and silver and crypto, you know what? You might want to think about as a tax strategy, getting rid of those things, taking the loss. You can buy them back in the future. I mean, you if you want to go back in 35, 40 days, you can buy them back and own them again. But trend is your friend in this kind of market. You want to stay with what's working. And it's very, very clear that even in spite of the tariffs, the Iran war, there's a lot of companies that are doing very, very well. So look, war. ⁓ we have to talk about it. I've had a lot of people ask me, gosh, the war, I don't really know what to do about it. I'm concerned about it. Hey, look, I'm a vet. We have many, many people that I mean, ⁓ certainly people involved in this show also served in the military. W I know it's difficult, and you you don't want to mix economics with war. The human toll and can and ⁓ you know certainly ⁓ the death tolls are seem to be rising right now. But the problem that people have, and I had the same talk with people in 2000, you know, dur certainly during nine eleven, same talk with people when we invaded Iraq. You know, the markets typically go up, not down in the long term during war. So again, anybody trying to politicize the war, especially now that it's a mid-year election year. And that the economy's gonna die because of this, or it's gonna affect us. Folks, I've studied every war since the war of 1812 and the effects on stocks, on real estate, and on bonds. And I'm telling you that overall, they go up during wars, not down. The big issue, in my opinion, and this is the thing we all have to monitor: inflation levels typically do rise during wartime economies. Now, this war, you know, we've only been in it for four months at this point. ⁓ I'm I don't think the inflation caused by it is gonna be forever. But as long as you have oil prices acting like a pogo stick, you're gonna have ⁓ situations with inflation, or worse yet, that a lot of times companies will raise prices because they're fearful that inflation will go on for a long time. So again, it's it has to do with the length of the war. Okay. So again, don't try not to buy or make too much out of the geopolitical. What I would tell you is this. I think you're better off owning good old fashioned US stocks right now. You start trying to buy stocks in the Middle East or in South America or certainly what's going on in Europe. I think you're much better off here as long as the dollar stays stable. And right now, knock on wood, the that's been the big surprise for a lot of people. The US dollar has actually held its own. This is nothing like the nineteen seventies when the dollar fell out of bed about twenty five percent very quickly. So listen. We're gonna jump to our guest. I really can't wait for the interview that's coming up. And and then we'll talk more about ⁓ in segment four about what other things in the news we need to cover. But anyway, we're gonna take a quick break to hear from our sponsors. We're gonna come back with our guests. This is Ken Winins with Winning With Winins. We'll right back. And welcome back to Winning with One. It's Las Vegas' newest and coolest financial show, business show. And soon we're gonna be talking about alternative energy. Hey, you know what? I have some of the most interesting guests who live in the Vegas area. And my new friend, Steve Ullman, by the way, is not a member of the Duck Dynasty family. I know he has that look. And ⁓ and I'll tell you what, he shoots better than they do. So that's okay. Steve, how you doing, buddy? And I'm doing okay. I mean, we got a lot to go. It was just like when we were speaker-1: ⁓ I'm doing fantastic. How are you doing then? speaker-0: Talking before the show, we're we're gonna cover the gamut here. Yeah. So let's talk about, you know, it's funny how we vets meet each other. And I appreciate you coming to the Winning with Winus, you know, ⁓ cast launch. That was a fun party. speaker-1: ⁓ yeah, yeah. And then ⁓ I really I always I always love a good place where I can put on the purple tucks. You know? Yeah. speaker-0: And ⁓ you know, it takes quite a man to wear a purple tux. It really does. speaker-1: I'm c I'm I'm very very comfortable with my sexuality and I feel like that's what I'm projecting now. speaker-0: We can talk about that in Las Vegas. So all right. So listen, let's talk a bit about your I mean, you've got a fascinating background, you mean between what you did in in Hollywood related businesses, ⁓ obviously your time in the military, your upbringing. You can't you're a Michigan boy. Yep. You know, talk about that. And then obviously what you're doing now. So fill us in. The pitch. speaker-1: Okay. All right. Well, ⁓ basically I am ⁓ an actor, an entrepreneur. ⁓ I have I've started a few businesses. I I I grew up in Michigan and I was a horrible troublemaker. ⁓ I got into lots of trouble, ⁓ but I was always told to get a job. So the entire time, like while I I I was like getting in trouble, I started my own businesses as a kid. And I was making money. And next thing you know, I got into enough trouble to where my recruiter, my recruiter tells me, listen, okay, we just had the police department in our office. ⁓ we need to just get you shipped out. We need to get you through school. And we need to get you get, yeah. Like I I I was horrible in school. Everything. It was, it was, it was actually, it was honestly crazy. I graduated with like a 1.8 GPA. ⁓ wow. And then I went. straight into the army, fresh out of school. and I I gotta say, like I'm such a proponent for the military because I was I was lost. And once I got in the military, ⁓ I mean I still was a troublemaker, but ⁓ but it it did something to me. And when when I went to combat, I spent ⁓ 15 months in North Baghdad from 2007 to 2009 with the 25th infantry. And returning from that, ⁓ I just was a different person. I saw I saw the whole world a completely different way. Like I always was a go-getter. But coming home from that and then and then I'm back in Michigan. And ⁓ I I get out of the military. I'm back in Michigan and I just look around and and I actually could not stand being at my mother's house. I ended up homeless for a bit. I I I would start couch surfing and but I would look around, I would see other people doing like the same thing they were doing back in high school and Before I could fall into that, I was like, okay, we need to do something. So I threw everything I could fit in my truck and I drove to North Carolina. I enrolled in the NASCAR technical institute. The only reason why I went there was someone who taught who I met in Iraq, worked there. So ⁓ some contractor and I enrolled there and then they looked at me and they told me, Porsche is impossible because they take 12 kids a year out of every tech school in the country. And I'm like, impossible. Well, hold my beer. And I graduated top of my class with a hundred percent attendance, first place in 27 courses, and got a job working for Porsche fresh out of school. And from there, I ended up in the Porsche shop. I was ⁓ I I dealt with all different Porsche models, especially even cup cars. I was ⁓ inspector on these cars for ⁓ Seabring in Florida. I worked out of Tampa and I got to this point where I go, I've always wanted to perform. I've always wanted to be an actor. My whole life I wanted to be an actor. Like and my family would always tell me, get a real job. Go, go get a real job. Like that's not real. And I would try I had no friends and when it my early years probably would drove me to trouble. ⁓ and my I would try out for every talent show, but I speaker-0: I was gonna ask you, so d as a kid you wanted to do it even back then. Yeah. Okay. speaker-1: I would try out for every talent show, but I didn't have a talent and I didn't know what I was gonna do on the stage. I just knew I wanted to be on the stage. That was all I knew. And there was a moment where I was sitting there working for Porsche, and I'm in this back of this shop. I'm I've got I've did it. I got the job. I did, you know, go get a real job. I got it. I got it. And I hate my life. I don't want to be here. So I quit. I I I I call it the power of fuck it. You get to a moment. And I just quit. I was like, I was like, and then they were you how people who killed Avis jobs like you tell them to go do exactly what I did and they can come and have this job. Yeah. And I went on this journey, ⁓ where I started doing film and and I fell into I ended up going like I once you start a journey like that, you have to go through the shadow. And I don't know if you ever heard of like shadow work, it's something big that I talk about. You have to go through the shadow, and in the shadow, I Became the troublemaker again. I fell back into drugs. I I I was working on film. I was doing a lot of stuff, but it wasn't stuff I was proud of. And I hit this moment in 2020, during COVID, where I was I actually was smoking meth. I was making films. Like I was, but I I would basically just sit on my computer meth out and like and I actually made really good, I was so functional. Like I I did all the research. I was driving a Hellcat. I was Did all the research and knew what vitamins to take. So like you would not even tell. But deep down, like I was I was dying inside and I I just have this moment where I realize like you're useless until you're clean. Like I heard this voice in my head that said, You are useless until you are clean. speaker-0: Okay, let me ask you, when you were in combat in Iraq, did you did you use alcohol and drugs to calm you down there? speaker-1: ⁓ actually I got in trouble for using alcohol and drugs. speaker-0: Right. So I'm just curious. I mean it's a common tale we hear 'cause you you've seen a lot in your life. Yeah. You went through a lot of stuff. Anyway, I'm sorry to interrupt you. speaker-1: No, no, that's that's fine. But yeah, no, that was ⁓ there was that. And then also during the the healing journey that I went on after this, I found out that ⁓ there was a lot of childhood trauma repressed stuff that I didn't even know about. And what I always try to tell everybody is when you take on that journey of fuck it, you have to face the shadow. And I don't regret any of this. Because it brought me to this place where I got to realize, like, ⁓ my God, there's things that happened when I was a kid that I had no clue about. And now I was able to hold space for that kid and start rebuilding myself. Cause that was the moment where I moved to Vegas and I locked myself in an apartment. I moved from Tampa to Vegas, shoved everything I could fit in this Hellcat and drove all the way out here. I locked myself in the apartment and I was like, we are going to sit here. Like I had a house, I had bills. I say, we are sitting here until the withdrawals are gone and we're going to rebuild our life. Wow. And it's great. Yeah. I I I started out with this. I'm going to take a shower. Like you take a shower, you win the day. You just one win a day. Just take a shower. And then sooner or later I turn and take a shower. Put your pants on. Take a shower. Go walk the dog. You know, and and then I went out, walked into an acting academy. And I was like, you know, I tried to do it this whole other way. I was like, now I'm going to do it the right way. And I walk into an acting academy. And I'm like, okay, I'm listening to the instructor. And after a few months, I get my first standing ovation. That was January second, twenty twenty-one was the last time I ever touched a hard drug in my entire life. And once I got that standing ovation, I never looked back. speaker-0: Wow. To you, bud. That's cool. Well, you know what? And I think too, I mean, there's something about, I mean, I I know for me, I I there was a period of time in my life where I used to say, I somehow have managed to piss the universe off. And I know that I started going to church. And I found a pastor who ironically was an army chaplain in a Ford operating position in Iraq. And, you know, I went to one of her services and I realized I don't have any problems. I really don't have any problems. I these are solvable issues. Yeah. And you know what? God bless you for doing what you did, sir. But that's Vegas. See, I I believe that there's something where, you know, everybody comes here, like you said, they there's something going on in their past, but there's something about a place that doesn't judge that that it is firing on all cylinders. Excuse the punk car, but this place is firing on all cylinders. ⁓ on and it's just it's amazing how you can move forward. Yeah. So here you are now, you've moved forward. You and and did you so did you do ⁓ did you do more acting after that? speaker-1: Well, well basically I started acting and then the thing about Vegas, right? I always knew there would be work. So I had to give up everything that I was doing. I got and I started driving Uber here in Vegas. That's how I got to know the town. And and during COVID, Uber you made so much money. It was so good. but I I started driving Uber and then I just I focused everything into acting. Acting and ⁓ and then I get this Instagram ad for this ranch. ⁓ forty acres in the middle of freaking nowhere. And what happens is is I start realizing like when I'm working on my acting, I like to be loud. I like to to explore. Characters, you know, I call I call it like you crawl into the skin of the character, you know, and it's like this whole ritual thing. And ⁓ you get to live all these different lives and ⁓ and the the biggest part is you you you you get to let an audience feel things like that's what I love the most is like being able to convey something through a camera and make my audience feel. ⁓ so I I I bought this 40 acres in the middle of nowhere and decided that I am gonna Say fuck it again. I had no place to live out there. I had no cabin, no nothing. I put in my 30 days notice at my house and threw everything I could fit in a car hauler and just went out there and said, I'm gonna figure it out. And I built an entire ⁓ I'm sorry. speaker-0: No, it's very cool. That's just a cool. Hey, we're gonna take a quick break, Stu, because I wanna I wanna come back on the ranch. Yeah. So everybody, we'll be right back winning with wine-ins with this fascinating the throwback from the 1800s. I love it. All right, we'll be right back. And welcome back to Winning with Wineins. And I am your finance guy with a cowboy hat. But we got a guy over here. He lives on 40 acres of land in the middle of the desert. Talk about you could take Steve Ullman and stick him in the 1800s, and buddy, you would have been okay. Yeah, you might you might have ⁓ a few ⁓ skirmishes ⁓ along the way, but that's okay. ⁓ So, you know, be what before went on our break, we started talking about your amazing path and where you are with your ranch. speaker-1: Yeah, yeah, no problem. speaker-0: And I what I love is what you've done out of necessity on your ranch and you've turned it into a business. So let's talk about that. speaker-1: All right. Well, basically I moved out there and when I worked for Porsche, they they high voltage trained me. So I actually was learning how to work on the hybrids and electric vehicles before they were actually even out. Like when they were first coming out with them, I worked on Teslas. ⁓ Porsche trained me and all this stuff. Wow. ⁓ mainly because I was the new guy and nobody else wanted to touch them. So they forced me to do the training. But with that knowledge, when I moved off grid, I was like, Well, I need sustainable power. So I'm out here, like I said, I didn't have a cabin, didn't have nothing. I just I just moved out there and I just started building and figuring it out as I go. And then I ordered a bunch of solar equipment and I was like, I can figure this out. It's pretty easy, you know. And then I screwed it all up. Yeah. Every every bat, like it's totally it was like, this ain't working. I had like the wrong battery with the wrong thing. And so then I was like, we gotta sit down, we gotta study this. So I sat down, I read some books and got it through. And then I built a power grid out there that No bill, no nothing, never need to worry about it. And I I I actually had my ⁓ the the company was started with my my ex fiance and we we lived out there for two years. Two years completely off the grid, running an entire business. no bills. ⁓ nobody even knew we were out there, nobody even knew ⁓ that we built anything. It was it was the definition of absolute peace. ⁓ there was moments where we would go into town. And and I swear to you, you didn't feel like all the c commotion and chaos of this world was the real world anymore. You would come in and it was almost like we were observers of like all this chaos and it just became exciting. You know, it's like it's like, okay, it's like ⁓ look at all these people with like, you know, they got all these things going on in their minds and everything when they when we can just like go back and just have this absolute peace. And you can see the Milky Way at night. speaker-0: Yeah. speaker-1: And then when I would work on roles out there, I could just be wild and crazy and really, really feel out the characters, which brought me better roles. And ⁓ I had got my first like like Hollywood type experience while I was living out there. My agent hits me up and was like, ⁓ big film being filmed in searchlight. And he goes, actor got covid. ⁓ because they were a whole LA crew, everybody was from LA, but they were out here in searchlight. It's like he's like, one of the actors got COVID. Can you audition now? Film tomorrow morning. And I was like, send over the audition. Let's do this. And I was selected on the spot, and it was like I had filmed before, but when I went to this one, they they had somebody who was just gonna drive me across the street. They had a person following me around with a fan. make sure that I didn't sweat too much. They had a whole catering crew that would make me whatever food I wanted. And it was probably the most powerful performance of my life. My ⁓ scene partner was in Forrest Gump and he dropped his lines and he said it was because he was so busy watching the performance I put on and that was speaker-0: But which which which ⁓ movie was it? speaker-1: ⁓ so this mov film hasn't came out yet. ⁓ this is him. Yeah, they well this this happened two years ago because I think there was an ownership issue. So it's either gonna be called Pay Homage or Cinephile. And I have the longest monologue in that film. And ⁓ speaker-0: So we're all gonna have to go watch it, folks. Support our local actors. There we go. That's right. And so but in be but in between what you're doing with acting, you've started this amazing company that's really so hey, your property, is it in the Nevada side or the Arizona side? speaker-1: ⁓ yeah. It's the Arizona side, ⁓ just right next to Hoover Dam. ⁓ speaker-0: Okay, ⁓ yeah. Okay. You're literally just right there. Exactly. Okay. Well that's we can argue that's probably Nevada, but that's okay. speaker-1: I'm a Nevada resident. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I I stayed in speaker-0: Well, I I'm I think we need to go back and redraw the lines. I have a theory on that. Yeah. Well, hey, did you know that California stole land from Nevada back in the eighteen sixties? Really? ⁓ yeah, we had fights over it. Yeah, we were supposed to have part of the Sierra Nevadas and yeah. So if I get elected, I'm gonna get that land back. I'm gonna make them well, hell yeah. And I'll tell you what, when they start coming to us wanting money from us to pay their bet their debts, yeah. Tell you you guys are gonna pay us back. Yeah. speaker-1: ⁓ you got my vote? speaker-0: Yeah, it's a podcast. We see what we want. Yeah, cat yeah, Gavin Newsom, you're just hearing what I said. All right, so listen, let's talk about your company. So I think it's amazing because I mean when when people talk about solar panels and they talk about solar power and you know, ⁓ we'll we'll talk a little bit about windmills and stuff. Yeah. ⁓ I don't like personally that they take it the whole thing and lump it all together and they make it political. I don't like that. Yeah. And so what you've done is to say, no, wait a minute, hold it, hold it, hold it. Let's dissect this stuff up. What works and what doesn't work. And then also what works and doesn't work in one region might work in another. Yeah. And you know, when you're or state or county or whatever. So take take the floor, my friend. All right. Searchlights or ⁓ spot spotlights on you. Or limelights on you as you take it. speaker-1: Yeah, all right. So so ⁓ I run Arizona off grid solutions. Basically, once I got that grid going, I learned how to Build like I came from a vehicle standpoint from my electrical background with Porsche, self-sustainability, which I realized what's going on when they put panels on your roof, like the the the normal solar companies, what's going on is they're feeding the power grid, and then the power company decides how much they can lobby this and make it political as well. They can decide how much they're gonna give back, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. Like if you want to save your bill, that's a great way to go. Yeah, with my grids. You will never call the power company again. You are completely off the grid. Where if the power d goes down, like I can even back it up with with the power grid. speaker-0: So you do have a backup to the the utilities that you need. speaker-1: I I I can do that if I want to, but ⁓ or if if the customer wants to, I should say. but the thing is is if the utility goes down, your power never goes down. I've got I've got many where you buy a barren piece of land in the middle of nowhere, you put a tiny home on it, you call me, I give you power and you never need to worry about ever a thing ever again. And I can even put generator pigtail back up. So you can just plug a generator right into your grid. The the the biggest thing though, the the biggest misconception about all of it is that solar isn't reliable. Solar is very, very reliable. The the thing that we were talking about earlier about taking it all apart, renewable energy itself, you can't lump it all into one thing. There is so many different ⁓ nuances to everything. ⁓ I think one of the biggest ones for me is windmills. speaker-0: Exactly. speaker-1: People people will say, yeah, yeah, I I I'm not gonna lie, I've heard that so many times. People are like solar and windmills. Like, no, no, no, no. Get windmills the hell out of there. Like speaker-0: Well hang on, Stephen. You got a bunch of ⁓ out where you live. Yeah. I mean you go down what the ninety three and there's all they're all over the place on the east side. speaker-1: Yeah, yeah, and and like I said, like they barely ever spin. So, like my bobcat needs to be greased every eight hours when I'm using it. Imagine how much grease you need to put on a windmill spinning. And you gotta think too, you put these windmills in fields, right? This is where all the sand, all the dirt, all the dust is going. So when you don't see them spinning at all, it's it's because they they need more oil or some or or they've locked up. Now, if when you spe see them spinning out of control. The thing about wind power that a lot of people don't understand is that they have they you have to dump the excess power. It has to stay within a certain frequency. So when people see say there's a lot of wind, they'll think, ⁓ I just put a windmill up and I'll have power. It's not true because if the wind is going too fast and the frequency gets out of whack, you have to dump and waste all of that power. So We're spending all this money on all these big steel things that that take more oil than a freaking diesel engine because you gotta keep lubing the dang thing or else it breaks. It's killing the birds. It's also ⁓ it's also killing the fields. You know, we w when you can't let anything grow around them, you take everything down. It's like with solar, I'm also not big about like the big commercial solar fields, but what I am big about is if we all had our own solar grid and the freedom. 'Cause 'cause that's what it's this is all about is the freedom to know that you will be able to ⁓ protect your family. If if if all if anything went down, if the solar grid went down and everything, you are still able to take care of your family, have your own power. And then we're also not pulling on the actual utility grid when we have a so solar like this. speaker-0: Hey, hey, I'm gonna stop you right here for a sec, okay? Look, I I'm everybody, this is we're gonna go to our podcast bonus section with Steve, because this is an important topic. But Steve, if anybody wants to get a hold of you, where's the best place to go? speaker-1: All right. So my Instagram is the Off Grid Veteran. ⁓ my ⁓ website for ⁓ my company is Arizona Offgrid Solutions dot com. And you can also find my YouTube channel where I run around in Ranger panties and a bandana and I blow shit up. And you can find that at the the Wolves Den Ranch on YouTube. Thank you. speaker-0: I'm all over that man. I'm all over. All right, now listen, we're gonna be right back, everybody. Please tune in to the podcast bonus section. This guy's a hoot. You gotta listen to what else he has to say. We'll be right back with winning with winens. And welcome back to Winning with Wineins on the podcast bonus section. And ⁓ boy, do we have a bonus section for you? We get to hear Steve Ullman unplugged. This is gonna be fun. And you can imagine me unplugged. So, I mean, I already went off about California stealing our land, so we're gonna go off on this. So when we left off, you were talking about, you know, what you're trying to say, but and I agree with it, that you need to dissect the entire alt area of energy and say, look, some and you know what. This is the thing I always love about Trump. They always Trump Trump was right. Windmills don't work, but I like that. I will work on that. I will and but he's also not big about things being subsidized forever, which I agree with. So what are you finding now as you're looking forward? You like house to house, not you know, big windmill or big solar farms, not big send it back to N V Energy or whomever, right? speaker-1: Yes. Yeah, so so the the biggest thing is is that once we ⁓ one second here, there we go. The biggest thing that I'm learning is is that once we lump things together. I mean anything. Like anything on like like even even when people will lump races together. When like anything. We need to stop lumping things together. I I I believe that wholeheartedly. Because when it comes to your renewable energy, I think one of the biggest problems I run into too is that people will always want me to add a windmill as well as solar to their stuff. And I try to explain like listen, like like you don't want to do Yeah yeah well people are like, well there's wind. So obviously windmill speaker-0: Yeah. work right all right wait wait you're gonna like this you want a little history lesson on windmills ⁓ yeah okay which country had the windmills Holland Holland right Holland okay but now remember their their country was a third under water I mean I know it's for vaccine my family's Dutch okay the windmills this is long before electricity what were the windmills for pumping water yeah fine you don't need to have them work all the time just need to make sure water gets to a certain level speaker-1: Pumping water. speaker-0: Turn the thing on. It was not meant to go all the time. So wherever they got the crazy idea that let's just have these things spinning to produce electricity, history does not support that at all. speaker-1: Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. And I actually seen some ⁓ some old ⁓ windmill pumps ⁓ on some properties I've worked on that still work great. speaker-0: Like the farmer, the little the little it was all it was pumping water. It had zero to do with power. Zero. So I don't know it but it's so you're now finding so as far as I mean I and I do love the fact 'cause, you know, we'll talk in a moment about all the other things you and I are involved in, but are you this does not require government subsidies. Am I correct on that? speaker-1: No. ⁓ wait, ⁓ what what do you mean by government subship? speaker-0: I mean, do you I mean you can make this profitable without the government having to give you a credit on your taxes, correct? speaker-1: ⁓ yeah. ⁓ yeah. Well well the thing is is that that currently right now because they they have they have this ⁓ they used to have the thirty percent tax credit. Yeah, which which would help, but like currently right now all the states are ⁓ all I mean I can't say all the states. I can say that Nevada and Arizona, which is where I operate, ⁓ they're the all all solar is tax free. So so basically if I do a complete solar unit for you, it is tax free. ⁓ also when it raises your property taxes, that ⁓ it well, it'll raise your property value, but it won't raise your property taxes. So those those are what they're they're replacing with because they got rid of the 30% tax credit last year. Okay. So, but the like what I always tell everybody is this if you're looking to save on your bill, go get normal solar where they put the panels on your roof and it feeds the grid, which is fine too. ⁓ because you're you're you're not putting so much stress on the grid when you do that, which which does help. speaker-0: ⁓ okay that's good. speaker-1: But I also don't like the fact that the power company can lobby and be like, hey, we don't want to pay them back as much as they should, and you're paying for those panels. Now with one of my grids, it's basically think of your house being its own separate unit. And you're not even like you don't need the grid at all. You'll be running purely off of one of my solar grids, as if you're off grid and you can do this even in the city as well. ⁓ speaker-0: So ⁓ wait, hold it real quick. So somebody in Metropolitan Las Vegas could have your unit. How big is this thing? speaker-1: Well, that's the thing. It depends on if it'll fit in the yard. It depends on what you need for the house as well. But the beautiful the beautiful thing about it is if you do have enough room in your yard, you could have this unit and I can plug in the utility as a backup, but all the utility grid would ever do is just charge the batteries. So if if there's cloud cover for multiple days, it will use the utility grid to charge the batteries, but you're still just gonna be running off of the batteries. The difference in our units and why they're they're more expensive is because I have to build a unit with all the stuff to push that power because we're not using the actual power plant to push it. But I'm a whole sole believer though in getting rid of ⁓ like what we were talking about with the solar fields. I love solar, don't get me wrong, but I do believe in ⁓ in ⁓ like like power plants. I I believe in like the Hoover Dam and how how how they ⁓ generate power. I I don't think that a power plant should be ran off solely solar because it ends up killing all of the environment so much. Exactly. But I believe that if we were to put everybody on so ⁓ on solar single like single houses on solar, and everybody was responsible for their own power ⁓ and how much consumption that they use, and they would also have the freedom to decide and choose with their power, that we would we would take such a less of a a pull on speaker-0: Underneath the yeah. speaker-1: These main grids. Yeah. And we wouldn't be worried so much about power all over the place. But I don't think that anybody would ever allow that to happen because if people were all off grid in their own right, in some way, shape, or form, you can't control them, which is something that I I I feel is something that we have to worry about. speaker-0: Yeah. Well, we're we're still dealing with post COVID when the government had a taste of full power and ⁓ excuse the pun. And ⁓ you know, they're learning very quickly. Thank you to President Trump and, you know, the houses of Congress letting go of stuff, deregulating stuff. You know, in in our state. You know, I'm I'm a very I'm a big fan of Joe Lombardo and and ⁓ you know Savros Anthony. I mean leave leave people alone. Let them do their thing. Yeah. You know, and ⁓ the fact we don't have legislation running all the time, constantly going, you know, they they can't screw things up. Now, interesting. ⁓ the legislative session that's coming up next March. ⁓ I was in a a group ⁓ because I'm very active with the Chamber of Commerce in Las Vegas, and I can tell you. That the green network that they are talking about statewide, this is a serious topic. I mean, both sides are agreeing to this, that they want to basically modernize our grid. And then basically part of it is to take our dependency away from California of the of the conventional power plants of California. Because we we can't build our own. We don't want to build new pipelines of natural gas from the east. So what's the logical thing for us? We're we're logical for alter for a solar alternative that really does power our growth needs. It's interesting. So you have the state actually agreeing on this, which is wonderful. Yeah. Now what do you find in here? Now you were telling me earlier about how different it is operating in k in Arizona versus Nevada. speaker-1: ⁓ yeah, yeah. So Arizona, well, I I'll say Penal County, which is, you know, Phoenix, which is, you know, basically the Arizona that everybody thinks of. No. ⁓ they they ⁓ they do not like solar. ⁓ so we we have we have issues where the power company has been running this, I I'll call it it it almost feels like a mob speaker-0: Which is the capital of the state. Yeah. speaker-1: Monopoly on everybody down there. The Penal County is the hardest to pass permits or anything on solar. And I got one of my units in there in a neighborhood where Penal County ⁓ well APS ignored them, you know, for about a year. And these people were about to actually walk away from their homes because they could not get power there no matter what. And I put a solar grid in the middle of that neighborhood and got them completely off the grid, said you never need to call them again. And guess who shows up a week later? APS. They to install power, trying to tell them to take down my grid. No. speaker-0: W how far out now this is in Phoenix? This is how far away from downtown Phoenix were they to not have power? Okay, here I'll get speaker-1: ⁓ they were far. This is out like Penot County still goes out all the way to like superstition mountains and stuff like that. Yeah. Yeah. So this was ⁓ a Florence would be the actual town. Florence, Arizona. All right. Yeah. But but yeah, they they show up there and then they tried to say that we did it wrong, and my engineers ⁓ argued with them, and ⁓ turns out that I just got one passed in Penot County because we did it right. speaker-0: There's someone way out there. Okay, there's nothing out there, yeah. speaker-1: But that's the type of crap that they put you through. When I deal with ⁓ when I when I've dealt with Clark County on on all of this, it was actually it was so simple that I almost want to become Nevada off-grid solutions. I'm not even gonna lie. ⁓ it was it I I don't really deal with anything. I I was able to get grants here and everything. There they were like, Yeah, come on in. And and ⁓ I helped ⁓ a church had this off-grid guard and I I did a charity job for them and helped them get completely off the grid and everything so they can keep providing services, rehabilitation services for people through gardening. Yeah. And and yeah, because that was all through the the state grants and everything. And they were like, yeah, yeah, no, please come on through. So Nevada is way smarter about when it comes to the solar. Like, like I I don't understand why like like Arizona, especially when you got so much land of people just waiting on power on why they make it so hard. It it doesn't feel right to me. Well, speaker-0: I'll I'll just throw this out. It's not just your industry. This state, at the end of the day, and I think it is also like I was mentioning earlier about the way we govern ourselves, it's a part-time government. It means everybody in the assembly and the senate, they all have jobs or companies or whatever. So there's an attitude of, hey, just go make money. You know, just don't do it illegally. Don't don't be a ⁓ you know a threat to society. But you know, we are the business state, we're a free state. And I unfortunately my experience has been when I go to Arizona, yeah, it's technically a free state, but you can tell the powers to be there, there's a fight, I think, for in my opinion, Arizona's identity. Yeah. I really believe that where it's not here. People here know you're you know, we are purple, but purple mean that either side can be thrown out if you interfere too much. That's my take on Nevada. You know, and I well just face it. I mean, also I think ⁓ I mean, look at where our capital is. So you talk about a place that needs solar, Carson City. The heck out of the middle of nowhere, you know. So it is pretty fun. Now let's talk a little bit about your spread, your 40 acres. Now I we started talking about this earlier. Yeah. So you know, I bought a gold claim on the other side of the hills from you. Yeah. That is so funny because that whole area, it seems like we all end up down in that area, some way, shape, or form. So I'm looking forward to coming and see your spot. speaker-1: ⁓ yeah. ⁓ yeah. speaker-0: And I need you to come out to my goal claim and and of course you and I were also joking about rattlesnakes. Yeah. So let's throw a couple of good rattlesnake stories in here. Now that one about you and the sh and where you were taking a shower. speaker-1: Yeah, yeah. ⁓ yeah, okay. So like basically I I had a moment where my friend was almost convincing me to just catch and release. And then I'm taking a shower, you know, I got an outdoor shower. speaker-0: Hold it, hold it. Curious. Yeah. It sounds like something that came from the former Golden State. Okay. speaker-1: No just No, no, he was he actually ⁓ is a friend of mine, he actually was an army ranger. But he's ⁓ he's the type of person where I have no honestly, I have no clue. 'Cause he was like, Well, he told me he was like he was like, Well, if you let me know, I'll catch him and I'll release him. I think he honestly likes to play with rattlesnakes. I really think that that was like the whole thing. ⁓ man. ⁓ but speaker-0: Yeah, he's been in the woods too long. That's how speaker-1: He's he's a great man, I love him, but yeah, his skin and everything. Like he basically for fun, he's he's almost he's 82, I think. And for fun, this man will do like 20 mile hikes. Yeah, well, he's three miles away, but that's my closest. ⁓ speaker-0: And he's your neighbor? Yeah. Yeah, got you. Well, so, but I mean, you know, it's funny because I think I was telling you story. Not far from where I live, there's a an area and they actually have a rattlesink habitat, believe it or not. And they built a fence that was more like a fence you'd find on a horse ranch. And they somehow they have a walking trail on one side of this thing, and then the then it says big signs rattlesing up and I I I did a little video on this and I said, What, the snakes are gonna not come over to the path? Are you people nuts? You know, but anyway, no, it's it's always my joke about r 'cause like I you know, I grew up in a rural area. You you shoot the damn things. I'm sorry. I'm sorry if I piss anybody off. I'm sorry. You take some snake shot, you put it in your pistol, and without hesitation, you waste ⁓ speaker-1: Well, well, that one snake where I was taking the shower and it rattles. Yeah. I let him live. I was like, I was like, you know what? I'm gonna let him go. Now I have ⁓ two dogs, Ghost and Phantom. ⁓ they're German Shepherd Belgium Malinois mixes. They they are my everything. Ghost goes with me to job sites. He keeps mountain lions off my back on job sites, Phantom. She goes with me to sales, she helps me ⁓ sweet talk people and she gets these cute little eyes. speaker-0: You know how I feel about Shepherds? I love them. speaker-1: Ghost gets bit by that snake that I let live. The next day. speaker-0: How soon after the So the damn thing was there the next day? Yep. speaker-1: And ghosts, ghosts got bit, and after that they all die. I don't even care. And I made a I made a funny video around the first one that I did too, which ⁓ is on the Wolves Den Ranch. ⁓ it's ⁓ yeah. The first one I killed, I I headshot with ⁓ with a five five six. I knew I'd make that shot. speaker-0: That's pretty impressive. Yeah. No. Well, no, and look, I think it's also that we're Westerners, we're Western states. You know, you go to some other areas, people do not understand. Like you talked about mountain lions. This is kind of interesting. So when I went to get my hunting license this year, getting tags was nearly impossible. I mean, I was really blown away. In fact, my friend who works on the podcast said the same thing, couldn't get tags. So guess what I was able to get tags for? Mountain lions. There's so many mountain lions around here. speaker-1: What speaker-0: They're they're basically begging now the problem is to go hunt them. You better have dogs. You better know what the hell you're doing. Okay, they will attack you. Yeah. You better know what you're doing. But yeah, they they they're begging people to go hunt them. Literally I'm begging them to go hunt them. Well, I was I was telling somebody, I said, Yeah, I need a new rug. ⁓ I'm sorry. I'm busy. ⁓ It's you, Steve. You're bringing all this this non-politically correct stuff out. But no, I think ⁓ but it's you know, again, I've said it so many times. speaker-1: Might be a fun hunt. speaker-0: This is what I love about living here and interacting with people here. I mean, who knows where you and I would have ever met. You know, but I just like and I I you know, I thank you for supporting this podcast. And, you know, I and I looking forward we're gonna do a remote broadcast. ⁓ yeah. And and then you're gonna help me find gold on my property. speaker-1: Exactly. Yeah, yeah, definitely. And then ⁓ we can also even look for it on my property. There you go. Yeah, you you have you have the tools and equipment and everything and ⁓ speaker-0: Yeah, no, and we get to go blow stuff up, you know. ⁓ yeah. You know, if if if we c can we bring some claimers on, go click, click, click. speaker-1: Yeah, we we can do pretty much anything that we want to do. And that is the whole purpose. That's what I love about ⁓ my YouTube channel and the ranch because I also have a bobcat and all the construction equipment to make anything as safe as we need to do. We're gonna be blowing up a few cars out there here soon. And ⁓ cool. Yeah. ⁓ one thing I do wanna say though on the hunting aspect, right, is When it comes to hunting, the big thing that people don't understand after living out there for for a few years, I I've really fallen into a a very native way of thinking. And it's like when you kill an animal, when you hunt an animal, especially if you were hunting a mountain lion, right? That takes a lot of lot of guts and courage. When you when you kill an animal and you make use, like so as it you you kill for you, ⁓ you kill for a purpose and you always make purpose of what you kill. That right there I think is way better than a lot of this stuff with ⁓ like PETA. ⁓ sometimes when when they need animals removed, I've heard about they actually like do things that are way worse for the animals that that like well. speaker-0: Yeah, there they're many because they're still euthanizing them. But I I don't know if you've ever gone through a hunter safety course, but a huge part of that course is about you're basically helping nature. Yes. I mean, hunters by their nature don't want to slaughter whole herds. Yeah. You know, but I I would like we talked about before the show, the this the pendulum has gone a little too far. And I think again, you know, is try where you can to fix from mistakes of the past. speaker-1: Exactly. speaker-0: But you know, there's the law of unintended consequences, like the wolf problem up in, you know, Idaho and and Montana. They've got a a breed there that was never there to begin with. And this thing is really dangerous. The things are, you know, they're eight and nine feet long. Yeah. I mean, this it's huge. speaker-1: Or or or the the the the pigs and ⁓ the boars in ⁓ Texas. Apparently it's freaking everywhere. speaker-0: ⁓ yeah, that's crazy. Yeah. No, it's ⁓ no there it's it again you gotta be be careful with Mother Nature. Okay, last thing. If people want to get a hold of you for any of the stuff you're in, okay, give your give your spiel again, buddy. speaker-1: All right. So you can find me on Instagram at the off grid veteran. ⁓ you can find my my business, my solar business is Arizona Offgrid Solutions.com. You can reach me at Steve at Arizona Offgrid Solutions.com. Or yeah, that's it. And ⁓ and then my YouTube channel would be the Wolves Den Ranch on YouTube. I also have a podcast. We've taken a a bit of a break called Mission Entrepreneurship. ⁓ that's where I've actually like went into I went into like Hurricane Helene and did volunteer work. Yeah. ⁓ Yeah. Me, me. Yeah. Me and ⁓ my ⁓ well now ex fiance, Carly, ⁓ we went to ⁓ North Carolina right after Hurricane Helene and and volunteered to help these ⁓ business owners rebuild. And then we used the podcast to kind of try to help raise awareness for their GoFundMe's because we found all the business owners that almost lost their businesses. So that was a big thing we do. I I I have a I have a big thing about like I don't My i as you could tell from my whole story, I I'm not very linear. You know, like I'm all kind of all over the place. ⁓ I I think that my my first and foremost, what I like to do is I like to help people. And that's what it all is, and that's what I think entrepreneurship is. I think with with investments, with with any of this stuff. It's all it's it's all about helping people. Like when it comes to moving money and everything like that, like what a lot of people don't understand is that we're all just here trying to help people. You know. speaker-0: Yeah. Well, you know, Steve, I'll say this real quick. I think that people of the West are a unique breed. I mean, I wear the cowboy for a lot different reasons, but also it's unique to who we are as a part of this country. You know, and I think that we all have to remember we're not all one big happy family. I mean, states have always had differences of opinion. That's fine. But I mean, I think that, you know, what you care about, what I care about, this part of the country is pretty darn special. Yeah. And we want it to continue to be free and independent. Let us live our lives. We don't need to be told what to do. You know, we're pretty good about solving problems amongst ourselves. You know, I I'm a obviously, you know, there are times you have to defend yourself. There's times you help your neighbors. You know, and that's that's that's ⁓ that's the West. You know, that's the way it works. Steve Woman, thank you for coming on this podcast. Thank you for having me. ⁓ my pleasure. Well, we're well remember, we're gonna do an off site broadcast. I can't wait. Listen, everybody, this is it. We're done with this ⁓ podcast bonus section, and ⁓ we're gonna take a quick break and come back to winning with winens. And welcome back to Winning with Winens Las Vegas newest and coolest financial show. I'm obviously your host, Ken Winens, and I hope you enjoyed the interview we had with our guests. You know what? I love all the guests that we have. They come from very different vantage points. They look at things differently. But you know, the one thing that we have to remember is that a lot of the things that are said about Las Vegas are simply not true, whether it's healthcare or education. Or even from the political front. I mean, we are really, I think we're doing great. And you know, while we're on it, I want to thank you for all the wonderful comments I've had about the interview I had in the Las Vegas Review Journal last week. In fact, ⁓ yep, ⁓ that was a, I have to admit, ⁓ that was a pretty good picture. I have to say I did like it. ⁓ and yes, that I was wearing a Setson in the summertime. I know I tell you all not to do it, but I was indoors. But listen, I want to talk about that article for minute because here were the big takeaways. And I thought that the reporter did a fantastic job. Hopefully, we're going to get them on the show in the near future. Okay, this first off, the idea of us diversifying the Vegas economy and including financial services. And by the way, financial services is not just money management firms, these are mutual fund companies, these are ETF companies, these are it could be insurance companies, financial planners. wealth managers. There's it's a very, very big market. But the more important part is that this is bipartisan. This industry doesn't need a lot of tax breaks. It doesn't need a lot of water. It doesn't need a bunch of land. That you know, we could basically plug and play a lot of these companies into what we currently have in the valley. And also I may I say to me it's a state issue. It includes also Reno for the Bayer, the San Francisco Bay. I I think again, we have a tremendous opportunity for people who actually want a choice in leaving California. But it's a huge opportunity. These companies are going to leave California. Hey, I go out there a lot. People have had enough. They really have between the taxes, the cost of living, the fact that many of the people in LA still cannot rebuild their houses after those terrible fires. I mean, it goes on and on and on. But if you're a business owner out there, especially in my industry where it's very competitive and we always have pressure on us about trying to make sure fees are very competitive, it's going to be very, very tough to operate that kind of business in a blue state such as California or New York or Illinois. I was and many of you might remember I was in Chicago about three weeks ago at a Morningstar conference, saw the same thing. I lived in Chicago for a couple of years, and it just makes me sad to see these beautiful old financial centers. That just don't have the energy or just what there was before. So listen, the other big takeaway, ⁓ you know what? And anybody listening here from California, Arizona, Texas, who work for the economic development things, I'm gonna make it very clear. Stop committing slander against Nevada. You know what? I don't understand. You know, look, if you wanna ⁓ and I'm look, I understand it's competition, but when I start hearing stuff about we're ran by the mob. Or that we're going to be running out of water in a year. And I think it's particularly funny that Arizona's making this comment, or California, you guys have much bigger water problems than we do. ⁓ you know what? It's just crazy. And I I did bring up ⁓ to certain powers to be that I really do I I mean, I'm hoping that if this continues, that our state attorney general will send you folks a nice little notice telling you to knock it off. It's ridiculous. Let's compete, let companies who are migrating out of the blue states decide where they want to go. But let's play fair. You know, let's try to do it with it in a dignified way. ⁓ all right, the other big thing, ⁓ it's an election year. I mean, one thing that came out of this article that I really did enjoy, I heard from both sides. I mentioned earlier it's a bipartisan issue. It is bipartisan, folks. ⁓ this is a no-brainer. ⁓ we want to figure out a way to diversify. both sides of the aisle agree this is a way to do it. So you have economics at play. It's an election year, but I think we're getting the message out loud and clear. But you know what? Let's switch gears here real quick. Cause another piece that's coming out in some of my recent Forbes articles has to do with what's on everybody's mind. Okay, that ticker behind me, when is it going to be the top of the market? You know, I get asked this all the time. Are we there yet? This volatility. I mentioned earlier, hey, we do have summertime volatility in the markets. That's not a surprise. But and it can get trickier. To try to understand what's going on in this market. Hey, even for people like me who've been in the game a long time, when you have old, you know, benchmarks like the SB Power and the Dow Industrial Average that are used in a lot of market research. But these companies are, you know, they're changing their components like it's a revolving door in a department store. You know, it gets a little tricky because you don't know, you know, are the indices changed in a way that makes them unusable to make comparisons of the past. ⁓ also, there's a lot of talk. in the papers this last week about whether it's necessary for companies to report every single quarter. Now we've had this debate much of my career about companies managing for quarterly results so the stocks go up and not for strategic. We hear this all the time that that's why China's gonna beat us because they look at things long term. I don't agree with that. No, but what the talk is about right now is that we would switch to every six months. Here's my problem. ⁓ I think that you could find that the surprises coming out every six months could be a lot more dramatic. It's also it would lead me to also wonder what could companies actually say in between reporting periods where they don't get in trouble with ⁓ certainly the regulatory groups or you know, class action investor lawsuits. I'm worried about it might be too much time to have guidance. And I know that as money managers, we're gonna have to continue to put out reports. ⁓ every quarter. I mean, clients are used to it. But let me just tell you this: things you're going to want to watch. Very simple things that you as an investor can monitor on your own. There's a gauge I use, I've written a lot about it called the 200-day moving average, which means if you were to take the SP 500 and you take its average for the last 200 days in price, is today's price above or below that average? If it's below, ⁓ at the end of the month, yeah, I think you need to go on your defenses. You need to maybe think about raising some cash. Just be aware that it happens a lot. And it it doesn't necessarily mean you're gonna instantly go into a horrible bear market that's gonna go down 50%, but it does mean that the market is very weak where it's dropped below where it's been the last 200 days. Also, the overall health of the market, there are certain things you can read in the paper or on social media sites called the advanced decline line. Of the New York Stock Exchange and the Nasdaq, the number of 52-week highs to 52-week lows. Hey, this is common sense. If a market has more advancing stocks than declining stocks, guess what? It's healthy. If you have more stocks hitting 50 ⁓ 52 week highs versus new 52 week lows, that's a healthy market. Keep in mind, I don't care what companies they are that are doing it. It's just that I want to see that the group overall is doing well, or as the doctors would say, that the patient is healthy. Also, keep an eye on volume and also the individual stocks themselves, if they are up, above, or below their 200-day moving average. What I can tell you right now is that the oldest companies that I track in the Wine's Legacy Stock Index, 72% of them are above their to individual 200-day moving averages. That is very healthy. Now, I just think again, you also want to look at things that might surprise a lot of people, things like margin expansion. You can track this yourself. Now, the the press get this wrong a lot. They say, ⁓ my gosh, margin levels have never been this high ever in the past. Well, you know what? Ask any realtor. When you are borrowing more money to buy a house where mortgages are expanding, that's a positive. That means there's more people buying. There's people buying bigger houses. Same with margin and stocks. Even with interest rates higher, we're still able to go out and buy stocks. I don't see that as a negative. Now again. If it get if it grows too far too fast, like it did in the 1920s, that's something we want to take attention to. But we're nowhere near that because people cannot, as of right now, borrow more than half the value of their portfolio. So again, there's already safeguards in place to protect you. Now listen, we're just about out of time. I do want to thank our sponsors. And listen, if you are interested in being a guest on a future Winnie with Wine and show, or even a possible sponsor. You know, go look at our social media site, folks. We're gaining a lot of traction, especially in the Nevada market. You know, go to Winning with Wine's ⁓ sh ⁓ website and send me an email. We'll certainly get back to you and we'll tell you more about what's going on there. If you miss this show, hey, guess what? We save them all on podcasts. You can follow us on social media. We're on all the major sites. But again, we archive the shows on WinningwithWinens.com. Okay, I write I try to write monthly Forbes articles. I'm a little behind schedule right now, but Go read my last several Ford's articles for literally the last seven or eight months. I think you'll find them very interesting to help you get comfortable with what's going on in this market. Listen, I've written five books. Three of them are history books. I do think history is important to monitor. Go the last one is called Investment Atlas: Creating Wealth Using Historical Trends. ⁓ you can get it in in either digital or hard form. I highly recommend it. And listen, I I would ask you, please stay on after this podcast. And listen to our infomercial about Wynan's investments. You know what? Not all money management firms are the same. I think we can help you. And by all means, if we can't, we'll certainly point you to where you can get help with your investments. But listen, good luck with your investments. I thank you for your time this afternoon. I hope you learned something new. This is Ken Wynan signing off. Take care. Hey everybody, this is Ken Winins, the host of Winning with Wineins Podcast. And yes, our staff can actually spell, believe it or not, part of that new education process. Anyway, if you want to learn, besides spelling, how to invest money, tune in and learn some new innovative things. It's about having an edge. And in investing, that's what matters the most. See you soon. Boy, that time went fast. I hope you had as much fun as I did during this segment of Winning with Wineins. Make sure and tune in next week for another round of guest and interesting topics. And if you missed this, make sure and check us out on Spotify, YouTube, or go to our website, winningwithwin's.com, where there's a lot more information for you to follow. So good luck this next week. Look forward to seeing you then. Take care.