Chapter 35

“Plus,” Dad continued to me privately, “I was kind of hoping to invite Meredith to dinner. Joan recommended the Italian place on ninth street.”

“We have two cars, so I could go home after the bank, if you want something more private,” I offered.

He gave me a kind of blank look, so I continued, “She’s got a great smile, and it lit up her face every time she looked at you.”

“You don’t have to do that, unless you had other plans of your own?”

“I could always go to Applebee’s and see if Tammy’s working,” I teased.

“That might be a little uncomfortable, she’s more than an old friend, she’s an old girlfriend.”

“Ok, Tammy has successfully been deleted from my fantasy database. Ugh, I think I need to go home and shower now.”

He just chuckled, “Don’t worry, she never made it out of my spank bank either,” then went quickly quiet as the two women came back in.

I covered for him, “We think that we better head to the bank to get the check deposited, then we will be grabbing a bite for dinner. Would either of you like to join us?”

They looked at each other, then Meredith gave Dad the biggest smile, “I would love to, where would you like to meet? If you’re going to Northern Cattleman’s Bank, expect it to take about an hour of excellent service.”

“I’ve heard good things about Fazoli on ninth,” Dad responded.

“That would be lovely, see you there in about an hour?” she asked him.

“That sounds like an excellent plan, do they take reservations?” he asked.

“Leave that to me.”

After a goodbye handshake, we headed to the bank. Adam informed me, when I asked, that Tammy wasn’t working today, but her daughter who was just a little older than me, was working that evening.

The bank had a large parking lot, a drive thru teller, an ATM machine, and a walk up teller window. I was impressed that they were ready for anything. We entered, and the lone teller at the counter greeted us.

“We would like to open some new accounts,” Dad told her.

It took a moment, but an older man greeted us, and led us to his desk, one of several behind a glass privacy wall that separated the general lobby from the workers. Dad explained what we had, and what we wanted.

“The current FDIC insurance limits are 500k per person, per account type, except business accounts which are capped at 1.5 million. Savings and checking are considered the same account type. Investment savings are a separate account type, as is business checking and savings, and trusts and revocable trusts are also each an account type. Pure investment accounts of course are uninsured as investments are always a risk.

“I’d like 500k to go to Sam,” Dad began.

“We can create a trust account with a monthly draw. You can set it to become solely his at age 18. Ideally you would place it in a high interest savings account using CDs or government bonds so that the monthly funds were generated from interest not principal.”

“As for the rest, I’d like to create a business for taking care of operating and remodeling our home, but do it as a non profit for the family.”

“I’m not sure if we can get away with a non profit, but a family investment trust could provide an excellent method of providing funds for ongoing care for the home. Additionally we could create an open credit drawing account that would cover upgrades or any remodeling you did, but would be paid off by the accrued income from the investments, not the principal.”

“Let’s set up one of each with 1.5 million in each, the 500k for Sam as you described as well. We will link the two family trusts to the credit cards, so that they pay the expenses off.”

“Will we need new cash-back cards from this bank, or use our existing?” I asked.

It took some work, but soon we had everything worked out. I had a new credit card that had a limit of five thousand dollars, and the trust was expected to pay on that each month from income generated. The trust would be able to make slightly more than the minimum payment, should I use the entire amount. Dad had his two existing cards, each with cash-back that went to my Amazon account.

One card was a joint account, with each of us on it, that would now be used exclusively for utilities, food, gas, anything we needed for our lives. The second card was only in Dad’s name, but that would be linked to the remodel, as would a checkbook that drew from an equity line of credit.

Dad told him about dinner plans, so it would only take an hour. He would return tomorrow on his own to finish things up, like signing the DBA filings for the State. We didn’t worry too much about taxes on this initial payment because we knew we were going to sell the next batch of coins.

The final comment from the man at the bank, was to welcome us, and to remind us that wealth was all about protecting and growing the principal. Poverty was all about spending the principal for immediate satisfaction.

Dad left for his dinner with Meredith, and I went to Applebee’s, but I did curbside. They had pioneered curbside service, and most other big chain restaurants were starting to do the same. They had finally realized they weren’t losing business inside, they were stealing customers from fast food drive thru users.

I set my order straight into my pocket storage, where it would stay hot and fresh. When I got home I ate by myself and went to bed. I don’t know what time Dad got home, but I hope he didn’t stay out too late. He still had two more days of work before his next day off.