We were able to construct basically our dream house. We did that last year, and that was our third year of owning the practice. We still managed to save a boat- load of money that year too. There’s no way we would be in the position we are right now as far as with our home without Four Quadrants.
The Husemans stop by our office to discuss how they’ve benefitted both personally and professionally as their relationship with Four Quadrants has evolved over the years.
James Huseman, DDS, is a 2006 graduate of Indiana University School of Dentistry. Originally from northwest Indiana, James very much enjoys getting to know his patients. He communicates detailed, honest diagnostic information, and discusses the best treatment options.
Dr. Huseman lives in Noblesville with his wife Michelle, son Matthew, and twin girls Aubrey and Macey. He enjoys spending his free time vacationing with his family and his favorite pastime golf.
Michelle has been a licensed dental hygienist since 2003. She attended Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana before her acceptance into Indiana University Northwest’s dental hygiene program. Michelle enjoys the opportunity to help people improve their dental health and their personal appearance.
The Husemans stopped by our office to discuss how they’ve benefitted both personally and professionally as their relationship with Four Quadrants has evolved over the years.
Dr. James Huseman - I’ve been in practice since 2006, so this is my 10th year out. My wife works with me as a hygienist at the office, so she’s working part time. It definitely helps out. I see all ages, and I do pretty much everything as far as Dentistry has to offer. Mostly bread-and-butter procedures though, so I do a lot of crowns a lot of filings and see a lot of hygiene recares.
Dr. James Huseman - It was kind of a series of events . . . I was at the practice I’m at now and I was working for a corporate entity. It was coming down to the point where we had to make a decision about whether we would purchase the practice. Regardless of what we were going to decide, we were making decent money we had to figure out the best way to plan for future. We needed to see what we needed to do from a planning standpoint. To make sure we were going to be comfortable not only for the next few years, but also again in retirement and the future of our kids. As far as planning for college and such, we had no idea how to get that ball rolling.
Fortunately, we were kind of headed in the direction of Four Quadrants anyway. They were very normal guys, and when we talked with them, a lot of their savings strategies fell right in line with our ideas for saving money.
Michelle Huseman - We thought about (working with Four Quadrants) for a long time. I think we met a year before we actually signed on with them. We mulled over it in that first meeting all the stuff that we were given. It seemed right on track with us. Four Quadrants seemed very organized, and easy to work with. They were very easy to contact. If you have a question you can get to them, and someone will get back to you really quickly.
Dr. James Huseman - For me, quite honestly, I have zero stress about money. I don’t stress about it at all. It’s knowing that somebody is there looking out for our financial future and where we’re at now and making sure we don’t rock the boat; that’s the biggest thing. Having that freedom and that luxury of not having to worry about finances is huge. That’s one of the biggest things.
Michelle Huseman - It is nice to have a second opinion for sure. Someone other than us to go to for resources. We’ve used Four Quadrants in a lot of instances, not just purely financial. They’re a good resource for advice on complex decisions.
Dr. James Huseman - We wouldn’t be at the point we are in our lives right now without working with Four Quadrants. And there’s no way that we could aquire the knowledge they have: obtaining a loan for a mortgage, and making sure that we’re getting the right escrow payments made for the current mortgage. It’s all the little stuff. If we don’t know what’s going on we’ll get blindsided and end making expensive mistakes.
Dr. James Huseman - We were able to construct our dream home. We did that last year, and that was in just our third year of owning the practice. We still managed to save a boatload of money that year too. There’s no way we would be in the position we are right now without Four Quadrants.
Michelle Huseman - We probably would not have made the decision to actually start the building process. It was nice to have the approval and opinions of someone you trust.
Dr. James Huseman - The biggest thing for buying the practice was having somebody to look over the documents. I fix teeth, I don’t look at contracts. I don’t know what some of the language means and so having somebody look it over, someone to make sure that I was getting a fair deal on that was impportant. I’ve had contracts in the past that I’ve looked over and don’t know exactly what I’m reading. And then you come to find out that it’s not in my best interests; it wasn’t a 50-50 kind of situation.
When Four Quadrants was able to take a look at the agreement that we had with our corporate entity . . . they were able to determine that it was fair. There were a couple of things that we negotiated back and forth, but the confidence of having Four Quadrants on my side was an enormous relief.
Getting financing for the practice purchase was big as well. I don’t know one bank from another that’s why I could’ve just gone to the bank down the street and asked them. Four Quadrants was able to locate a bank that’s got a good rate for us, got a good program and will approve us.
Four Quadrants handled most of the application process for us, all I had to do was sign my name where they told me to. Again, they made sure that it was a fair deal. And then once we did make the purchase, Four Quadrants followed up with us on a month-to-month basis tom ensure that things are going correctly; that the bank account balances are where they should be; making sure overhead is where it needs to be. So working with Four Quadrants from day one has been a very beneficial experience.
Dr. James and Michelle Huseman - We saved money prior to our relationship, but not like we do now. But the interesting thing is that it’s money we don’t even think about missing. We put it into the brokerage account and we just don’t miss it. And despite that, our lifestyle hasn’t changed at all.
Dr. James Huseman - Before (we brought the practice) we had a paycheck, we put some money away but we didn’t have a long-term plan in place. It’s not something we would have thought about. Now we have a regularly occuring amount that goes in savings automatically and it’s not something we missed because we never really saved consistently anyway. Now it’s being stockpiled away for us.
Michelle Huseman - From the practice side, working with Four Quadrants has taken a lot of the stress away from Jim. They take care of so much behind the scenes for him. And that gives him more time to focus on the dentistry and not think about it when we get home. He’s not stressed out about numbers, because someone else is watching them.
Dr. James Huseman - I will tell you we worked with just the managing side of Four Quadrants for a while because we had our own accountant. Prior to going with Four Quadrants’ accounting, every single day I’m on QuickBooks entering stuff in there, and then my accountant is coming over to take a look at it, and messing with it and still at the end of the year we get a huge tax surprise! All that work and we still make costly mistakes.
So having taxes done by Four Quadrants now is such a time-saver, and I don’t have to worry about it. Then at the end of the month I get my P&L’s and the balance sheet is laid out for me exactly like it needs to be. So that’s enormous, having somebody entering the numbers on a daily basis, and making sure they are jiving and making sure that things that are forecasted are actually coming to fruition.
Michelle Huseman - Just that there’s a peace of mind knowing that someone else besides us is keeping an eye on everything and always doing the right thing. Our lives are a lot easier since Four Quadrants came into it. Like we talked about earlier, the financial stress isn’t there. I know a lot of couples argue about that especially couples that work together and that’s one topic we never even discuss.
Dr. James Huseman - Yes, money is not a conversation or argument that we have ever had.
Michelle Huseman: And I think the money that we’re saving for our kids future, I know that wouldn’t have been done on our own; we would’ve been saving, but it wouldn’t have been the amount of money that we are saving for college now.
Dr. James Huseman - There’s no way we’d be in the position we are right now as far as from a savings standpoint, without Four Quadrants’ guidance. It just wouldn’t have happened. We just don’t know enough about saving about brokerage accounts about managing an UTMA account for kids. That’s totally foreign to us, and so without their, again, guidance as far as where to put it and how it all works, it wouldn’t have happened.
