Between 2020 and 2025, the U.S. added more than two million new millionaires.

But in 2026, hitting the million-dollar mark doesn’t mean what it used to. And the gap between the average millionaire and the true top 1% is far wider — and far more structural — than most people realize.

In this week’s episode, I break down the actual net worth thresholds for the top 10%, top 5%, and top 1% — and more importantly, how wealth is structured at each level.

Because wealth doesn’t scale linearly.

It transforms structurally.

If you’ve been researching how wealthy families manage money, you’ve probably come across two terms over and over again: the Family Bank (also known as Infinite Banking) and the Micro Family Office.

Most people assume they’re basically the same thing.

They’re not.

In this video, I break down the real difference between these two approaches—and why confusing them often leads high-net-worth professionals to buy financial products when what they actually need is infrastructure.

You’ll learn why one is simply a tool, while the other is a full operating system for managing wealth.

Join me for The WealthOps Way—our free live masterclass designed to help you stop guessing and start running your wealth like a business.

You’ll go from scattered to strategic as you craft your own Portfolio Thesis—the foundation of everything that follows.

👉 In just one session, you’ll:

• Clarify your long-term vision
• Define your next best investment move
• Build the system that turns wealth into freedom

When? 📆 February 25th at 7pm to 9pm (Central US)

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I’ve spent the last 10 years studying how ultra-wealthy families build and protect their wealth, and I’ve spent the last four and a half years running my own Micro Family Office. What I’ve learned is simple: retirement at this level isn’t about how much you save, it’s about how you architect your wealth.

In today's episode I’m going to show you the four systems you need to build, why traditional retirement advice doesn’t apply to you, and how you can set up your wealth to work for you, not the other way around. By the end of this video, you’ll see why some people retire with $3 million while others with $10 million are still stuck working.

Join me for The WealthOps Way—our free live masterclass designed to help you stop guessing and start running your wealth like a business.

You’ll go from scattered to strategic as you craft your own Portfolio Thesis—the foundation of everything that follows.

👉 In just one session, you’ll:

• Clarify your long-term vision
• Define your next best investment move
• Build the system that turns wealth into freedom

When? 📆 February 4th at 7pm to 9pm (Central US)

In 2025, 1,000 new millionaires were created every single day in the US. But here’s the problem—the moment you cross that threshold, you enter what I call the financial service desert. You’re too wealthy for cookie-cutter financial advisors, but you don’t have the $100 million minimum access a traditional single family office.

The result? Highly successful individuals get stuck in analysis paralysis or make bad investment decisions, which can lead to million-dollar mistakes.

I’ve been there. In 2012, I made my first million and soon realized that the traditional wealth management options were not serving my needs. After talking to several wealth advisors, I realized no one had my best interests in mind. So, I studied how the ultra-wealthy manage their money through family offices—and built what I now call a Micro Family Office.

Today, my portfolio generates over $200,000 annually in cash flow, while still growing, and I’ve been able to retire at 51 and focus on what truly matters to me: my family and health.

In this episode, I’m breaking down the four-phase process I used to build my own Micro Family Office in 2026. These are the same steps you can use to manage your wealth like the business it truly is.

How can an 8% return outperform a 12% return over time?

The answer has nothing to do with taking more risk, and everything to do with what you actually keep.

In this episode, I break down the concept of Structured Alpha—a framework used by ultra-wealthy families to measure after-tax performance instead of headline returns. Most investors obsess over gross returns, but taxes quietly erode 2–4% of their portfolio every year. Over decades, that can mean millions lost to inefficiency.

You’ll learn why gross returns are misleading, how income type matters more than yield, and how combining income architecture with tax optimization can dramatically increase long-term wealth—without increasing market risk.

We’ll walk through real examples across different portfolio sizes and show how investors with $1M–$30M can systematically keep more of what they earn, letting compounding do the heavy lifting.

If you’re serious about building wealth like a business—and not leaving money on the table—this episode will change how you evaluate returns forever.

Most people listenins to this episode should not build their own wealth management infrastructure. And hearing that upfront might save you from a very expensive mistake.

Managing an $8M Micro Family Office has taught me something most content in this space avoids saying out loud: this approach is incredibly powerful—but only for a very specific type of person. If even one of five key conditions applies to you, building a Micro Family Office will likely create more friction than freedom. But if none of them apply, managing your wealth like a business may be the highest-return decision you ever make.

In this episode, I walk through the five reasons you should not build a Micro Family Office—covering mindset, time commitment, tax strategy, portfolio structure, and asset scale. This isn’t hype or theory. It’s a reality check based on running my own portfolio with a CEO-level operating model, where income, growth, and preservation work together as a single system.

You’ll hear why passive, “set it and forget it” investors are better served by traditional advisors, why proactive tax strategy can quietly add tens of thousands of dollars per year to your bottom line, and why portfolios under $1M usually don’t justify the infrastructure required. We’ll also break down the real weekly time commitment, what “active ownership” actually looks like, and the critical difference between drawdown portfolios and Evergreen Portfolios designed to fund life without selling assets.

This conversation reframes wealth entirely: a multi-million-dollar portfolio isn’t just an account—it’s a business. One capable of generating six figures in annual income with a fraction of the effort most people spent building their careers. The question isn’t whether you’re capable of running it. It’s whether this model truly fits how you want to live, think, and engage with your money.

If you’re frustrated with cookie-cutter advice, want real control over your financial future, and are serious about building generational wealth—not just spending it down—this episode will help you decide, clearly and honestly, whether a Micro Family Office is the right path for you.

At 51, I walked away from a tech executive career with $6M, not because I had “enough,” but because my portfolio generated income while continuing to grow. In this video, I break down how I built my portfolio to produce cash flow without selling assets—allowing me to retire early.

Most high earners face the “wealth trap”: accumulating millions but having no income strategy for retirement. I was stuck in this cycle until I discovered how ultra-wealthy families structure their portfolios. They don’t rely on selling assets. Instead, they build an Evergreen Portfolio: growth assets, preservation assets, and income-generating investments that fund their lifestyle without touching principal.

I’ll show you how I applied this model to my own portfolio, and how you can do the same. If you’re ready to stop following traditional advice and start building a wealth system that supports you now and in the future, watch this video.

Four years ago, one decision changed everything. Walking away from a tech executive career at 51 looked reckless from the outside—especially when the portfolio at the time was half the size of peers who were still working long hours. But there was one critical difference: while their wealth was just a number on a screen, this portfolio was already generating meaningful cash flow. Four years later, it has grown by more than $2M and now produces over $200K per year in income—without selling assets.

This episode breaks down why the traditional 4% rule quietly fails high earners and why so many people with millions still feel trapped in demanding careers. The 4% rule was never designed for people managing seven- and eight-figure portfolios, and it ignores one of the biggest risks retirees face: sequence-of-returns risk. When markets drop early in retirement, forced asset sales can permanently derail a portfolio—and most advisors still build plans that rely entirely on hope and market timing.

The conversation pulls back the curtain on a massive gap in wealth management. If you have under $1M, personal finance advice works. If you have over $100M, you can build a full Single Family Office. But between $1M and $30M, most investors are pushed into generic 60/40 portfolios that generate little to no income while charging substantial fees. This is what creates dependence on a paycheck long after wealth has been built.

The alternative explored in this episode is how ultra-wealthy families actually structure portfolios: never selling assets to fund life. Instead, they build Evergreen Portfolios designed around three coordinated categories—growth, preservation, and income. Growth assets compound long-term value, preservation assets protect liquidity and downside risk, and income assets generate consistent cash flow that funds living expenses regardless of market conditions. This structure allows families to ride out downturns without panic, selling, or lifestyle disruption.

You’ll hear exactly how this framework was implemented step by step—divesting concentrated stock positions over time, increasing liquidity, and deliberately building income-producing assets such as real estate, private credit, and income-focused strategies. The result was financial independence achieved not by guessing market cycles, but by replacing drawdowns with durable cash flow.

The episode also walks through the real-world math behind why this approach matters. In down markets like 2008 or 2022, portfolios dependent on withdrawals permanently lose ground, while income-driven portfolios continue operating and recover faster. Same starting numbers. Completely different outcomes.

If you’re managing between $1M and $30M, sitting on concentrated equity, or questioning whether the traditional retirement playbook actually works for your situation, this episode offers a clear, practical alternative. It’s not about chasing higher returns—it’s about building a system that supports your life today while still compounding for the future.

If you want to go deeper into how this Evergreen approach fits inside a Micro Family Office structure—and how to implement it systematically—this episode is the foundation.