How Charles “Chuck” Oese found his path to financial freedom with Fynanc
Career firefighter, Chuck Oese, shares how Fynanc changed his financial trajectory, allowing him to reach his financial goals while still doing his dream job.
My dream job and a ‘perfect plan’
In 2000, I achieved my childhood dream when I was appointed as a career firefighter in a ski resort town in Colorado. At just 26 years old, I had no savings or plans for my financial future, but I was blissfully happy. All I wanted to do was see a lot of fire and excitement at work and ski as much as possible on my off-duty days.
One of the first meetings that you are offered as a newly hired firefighter is with a pension representative. During this meeting, I was told I could retire with a pension when I turned between 55-60 years old. I was assured that my financial future would be stable and secure at retirement. I was promised approximately 70% of my highest three years average salary and that I should count my lucky stars that I was in one of the few professions that still provided a pension benefit. If all went according to the pension representative’s proposed plan, I could collect a pension of about $6500/month pre-tax in April of 2027.
As we proceed, you’ll see why this date is important to my financial story.
This pension income will be a nice addition to my financial picture in the future, and I am hopeful it will be there when it’s my time to retire. However, I no longer count on it for stability or security thanks to the education and strategies I have received from Fynanc and their team of coaches and financial tools.
Putting out my financial fires
As my responsibilities grew, my financial needs changed significantly. No longer in my carefree 20s, I had a family of four to care for, and my days were no longer all about fighting fire and skiing. I had my children’s college education to save for, and have you ever taken a family of four to a ski resort? Not cheap!
As I came to understand the need to build more financial security as I matured, I made a few key moves early on in my life that turned out to be very beneficial by investing in real estate in the early 2000s, in Colorado.
Over twenty years, the appreciation of my real estate assets was significant. However, while I could hold these properties through the Great Recession of 2008, by 2015, I had piled up mounds of debt that started choking our family finances.
My changing financial responsibilities and the challenging situation I found myself in led me to Dave Ramsey’s Debt Snowball Method, which helped us to clear up six figures of debt in less than two years.
“I was able to sell a property and clean up our situation in the short term. However, getting out of debt was not the solution, but rather a band-aid for a much deeper underlying problem that got us into debt in the first place.”
A fireproof financial plan
In 2018, my search for a financial plan that suited our family brought me to George Antone and the Fynanc team.
His teaching spoke to us, and we went all in and put many of his strategies in place.
I started learning about strategic debt, family banks, and the importance of putting into place different income sources. In addition to the very practical financial strategies that George teaches, he also helped me make a significant mindset shift in identifying my “why” and figuring out what my “perfect day” looked like and how to structure my financial plan around achieving as many ‘perfect days’ as possible in the not so distant future.
A fireproof money mindset
George’s wealth-building approach is not just about numbers, assets, and spreadsheets. It’s also about mindset training and empowering people to become productive members of their communities and make a meaningful impact on those around them.
When you understand why you’re spending time building wealth and you can picture your perfect day, it becomes much easier to put in the work to make sure you are making the right financial moves.
In the first two years of working with Fynanc, I did more to secure my financial future than I did in the previous 20 years in the fire service.
Blazing a trail with I.R.I.S.
Fynanc’s holistic approach to wealth building piqued my interest and motivation from the onset. However, my family and friends really became excited when we heard about the I.R.I.S. Income Machine and Income Amplifier in 2021.
I was part of Fynanc’s very first Epic Wealth intake, a group of intrepid investors who were the first to implement the beta version of Fynanc’s cutting-edge AI-based fintech, I.R.I.S. to guide our financial decisions.
My goal was to double the monthly income that I was projected to receive from my pension in 2027 all those years ago.
Remember from above that I can start collecting my $6500/month pension in April of 2027. I wanted to reach this passive income goal in about seven years, using the I.R.I.S. AI to align with my pension date, but I wasn’t sure if this was possible.
I shared my goals and numbers with the Fynanc team, and they assured me I could reach these numbers conservatively by 2029 or 8 years from my I.R.I.S. start date.
Trusting the process, I learned everything I needed to know to follow my plan. I haven’t missed a single contribution, transfer, or step that is lined out in my custom plan built by my Certified I.R.I.S. Specialist (CIS) Evelyn Zuk.
However, I still had my doubts, and I wasn’t sure I could double my pension income in just eight years, 20 years less than what I was promised by the pension representative in that meeting 22 years ago. Reaching this goal in such a short time and by using strategic debt and very little of my own cash was mind-blowing.
My fireproof financial future
Fast forward about 20 months, and many things have changed for my family and me. Following my I.R.I.S. plan involves working on it for about an hour per month these days, and it is much easier than any other investing or side hustle I have done up to this point.
We recently had our CIS Evelyn evaluate our progress, and we are ahead of schedule by two years. Our monthly passive income is growing extremely fast, and we should hit our numbers by November 2027, possibly reducing that timeframe even more and most likely before my pension date of April 2027.
When I first met George, my time was split between many projects, including side hustles and practicing as an acupuncturist in my own business.
I had very little time for my family and didn’t even realize that I was missing out on witnessing my kids growing up. While doing the work assigned by my I.R.I.S. coach to understand my “why” and “perfect day”, I understood that making as much time for my family as possible would be my work’s most important and rewarding outcome. This insight, combined with the numbers I.R.I.S. is producing, allowed me to close my practice and the side hustles which were stealing my days off from the firehouse. I have been able to focus on spending more time with my family and other activities I enjoy.
The cost of not finding Fynanc or the I.R.I.S. Income Amplifier Program would mean my time would still not be my own.
It is also important to note that working with Fynanc, I have become financially independent over the last few years. Although, I’m not in a hurry to leave the firefighting career that I love. It is, however, nice to know I don’t have to wait until April 2027 to retire and that I have created financial stability and security for my family and a legacy for future generations.
Becoming a financial firefighter
The I.R.I.S. Income Amplifier is just the beginning for our family. This program has impacted us so much that I trained to become an I.R.I.S. coach in early 2022 to assist in putting out the financial fires in other people’s lives. I want to share George’s knowledge and life-changing information with other Fynanc students.
We are also super excited to have begun introducing the Lifestyle and Growth Amplifier into our financial plan over the last year. These programs are sure to speed up our journey, and I look forward to a future of focusing entirely on my “why” and the many “perfect days” that lie ahead with my family.
If you would like to get started on your journey to financial freedom, start here:
