Jessica Zweig leads the thriving personal branding business: Simply Be. But the author of the new book "Be: A No-Bullsh*t Guide to Increasing Your Self Worth and Net Worth by Simply Being Yourself” only got to this point in her life because she was able to exit a toxic business relationship that brought her personally and financially to rock bottom. Plus she shares an everyday money tip that will help us reach our goals during the pandemic, no matter what obstacles we are facing. 

Jessica’s Money Story:

My first company was a magazine that I ran called Cheeky for seven years, from 2008 to 2014. I was 26 when I started that company. We launched the biggest platform for women in Chicago. We were the it fashion, food blog in the city. We had 100,000 local readers. And from the outside we were this really sparkly, successful business but on the inside we were very dysfunctional, toxic, and weren't really succeeding. And it was our first business. We were so young. I was 26, she was 24. I didn't know her that well when we went into business which is I think a common mistake people make when they meet someone they really love and they have that spark and then they get into business together and then they're like, "Oh my gosh. Business is like running a family and a marriage. It's such an intense relationship." And we really didn't know each other and so we just made a ton of mistakes. We opened up a ton of credit cards. She was managing the books, I was doing sales. We were so young, so green, so inexperienced and seven years later we had $75,000 worth of debt and I wanted to leave the business and she didn't. And so, I was willing to settle for my half of the debt and she was very, very upset with me for leaving and it was a really tough decision. I loved her, I loved the business. I mean, we were like sisters. We had a love, hate. After seven years of building something great with someone you do have a relationship. So it wasn't an easy thing but I think in many ways she looked at me like I was abandoning her but I was really just following my truth. It had run its course. I couldn't do it anymore. And I did want to clean up my side of the street and pay off my 50% of the debt with a payment plan because that's all I could afford. And I got a lawyer and she got hers and it just got really, really, really ugly and it took about seven, nine months for us to settle it. And I ended up paying 50% of the debt in one fell swoop and I had very little money in savings. I ended up having no choice but to just clear it and start from scratch.

Jessica’s Money Lesson:

Communicate. Be willing to have hard conversations. Money makes people funny. I also would say, don't ever talk about money in those conversations on email or on Slack or even on the phone. We unfortunately can't get together in person so if you Zoom, Zoom, but in-person is best. Having sacred space around conversations, honoring this is uncomfortable, honoring this is important, honoring this is going to make or break our business if we don't talk about it. And we just didn't communicate. Our communication style was so dysfunctional and broken. Because if you do then you won't need to ceremonialize these conversations so much because you'll already be in the same vibration, in the same page.

Jessica’s Money Tip:

So I actually write about this in my book. I have a whole chapter on accountability partners. Because attempting to do anything great and big and significant for your life you need someone to keep you accountable. You need someone to hold you in check. So whether that's writing a book, launching a business, saving money, paying off your debt, having a partner in it is I think the key to the success of it all. And to be frank with you, I'm very fortunate. So the pandemic disrupted my business in a lot of beautiful ways, in a lot of challenging ways. And one of the things I did is I applied for the PPP. I had a finance team at the time that I didn't really fully like, they were fine, and they wanted to charge me $10,000 to apply for the PPP loan which I thought was the most counterintuitive request I've ever seen because we were a small business going into a pandemic applying for a loan and they wanted to charge us money.

Bobbi’s Take:

Financial Grownup Tip #1:

Some of the greatest business and financial success stories come from people who have survived toxic business relationships, and used the lessons from those crushing and painful experiences to thrive in their next venture. - This past week the dating app Bumble went public. Its founder,  Whitney Wolfe Herd started Bumble in 2014..  after she very publicly left the dating app Tinder, where she was a co-founder- after a breakup with another co-founder. She is now the youngest female CEO to take her company public and is worth over a billion dollars. 

Financial Grownup Tip #2:

So many of us are having trouble staying on track to meet our goals during the pandemic- in part because it feels like no one is watching. I mean after all. We can and do literally work in our pajamas. We can quite literally take a nap between meetings. So it is time. Get an accountability partner. Get someone who will be committed to you- and to whom you will also be committed to keeping on track. And if you both aren’t doing that- break up fast and find another accountability partner. Nothing wrong with taking it a little easy, but this more quiet time will come to an end, and the opportunity to get to your goals without so many distractions should not go to waste. 

Get your copy of Be: A No-Bullsh*t Guide to Increasing Your Self Worth and Net Worth by Simply Being Yourself.

Follow Jessica!

• Twitter - @jessica_zweig

• Instagram - @jessicazweig

• Jessica’s website - www.jessicazweig.com

• Facebook - Jessica Zweig

• LinkedIn - Jessica Zweig

Follow Bobbi!

• Twitter - @bobbirebell

• Instagram - @bobbirebell1

• Merch - grownupgear.com

Full Transcript:

Bobbi Rebell: Question for you guys, are we ever going to get back to that whole dress-up for work thing the way we used to? I don't know. But one thing I do know is it is time to get out of those PJ's and those grungy t-shirts and we need to give ourselves an upgraded but still super comfy wardrobe that makes us smile and ideally makes our coworkers, our friends and our family smile as well.

Bobbi Rebell: I have so many friends that I've wanted to send little pick me ups to to let them know it's all good and that includes you. So that's why I created Grownup Gear a fun line of t-shirts, sweats, pillows, mugs, totes, and more that I guarantee will give you and everyone that you're Zooming with all day long a good giggle. Grownup Gear is about saying the things out loud that we tell ourselves silently like when you wake up and you look in the mirror and you think, "I can't believe I'm a grownup either." Or maybe you just want to be honest that you are still a grownup in progress or you want to send a gift congratulating a friend for paying off their debt. The most comfy sweatshirts, t-shirts, tote bags, mugs, pillows, and more give it to yourself or your favorite grownup or almost grownup friend. Go to grownupgear.com to check it out. For discount codes and sales follow us on Instagram at our new handle at @GrownupGear and DM us with any questions. And thank you because by supporting Grownup Gear you help support this free podcast.

Bobbi Rebell: The debt and the brokeness has made me value money today and cherish money and respect money and operate my money with so much more reverence and care than I think I would've if I hadn't reached that rock bottom. You're listening to Financial Grownup with me, certified financial planner Bobbi Rebell author of How To Be a Financial Grownup. And you know what? Being a grownup is really hard especially when it comes to money but it's okay. We're going to get there together. I'm going to bring you one money story from a financial grownup, one lesson, and then my take on how you can make it your own. We've got this.

Bobbi Rebell: Welcome everyone to a new episode of the Financial Grownup Podcast. We share money stories here that had big impacts on our guests lives and of course then they share with us the lessons from them. I'm your host Bobbi Rebell, Journalist, Certified Financial Planner and author of the book How To Be a Financial Grownup. If you're new here welcome. I'm so glad you found us.

Bobbi Rebell: So that clip that you heard at the top of the show was from author and personal branding expert Jessica Zweig. Jessica has a new book out called Be, A No Bullshit Guide to Increasing Your Self-Worth and Net Worth by Simply Being Yourself. I have to say I love that title. The thing about Jessica is that if you don't know her you would never know all the things that she has had to overcome to well be where she is now that included a toxic business relationship that lasted for seven years. The breakup left her with nothing hitting rock bottom at age 33, even having to ask her parents for money just to pay her phone bill. Just when we think we will be hitting our grownup stride you never know what's going to hit us. There is a lot to learn from this remarkable woman and she does not hold back in this interview. Here is Jessica Zweig.

Bobbi Rebell: Jessica Zweig, you are a financial grownup. Welcome to the podcast.

Jessica Zweig: Thank you so much for having me Bobbi. I'm pumped to be here.

Bobbi Rebell: Well, I am pumped to have you here. Your book Be, I'm holding it up by the way, Be, A No Bullshit Guide to Increasing Your Self-Worth and Net Worth by Simply Being Yourself is about to come out and it's your first book. Congratulations.

Jessica Zweig: Thank you so much. You know how much goes into it so thank you for saying that.

Bobbi Rebell: I really enjoyed learning so much about you and what you teach people in the book. What's interesting is you come across as having it all together which you do now I'm going to say but it wasn't always the case. You brought with us a money story that is sadly something many of us can relate to but often don't know what to do with, I should say that often don't know what to do about, and that is finding ourselves in toxic relationships personally and in business in work environments. Tell us your money story Jessica.

Jessica Zweig: My first company was a magazine that I ran called Cheeky for seven years, from 2008 to 2014. I was 26 when I started that company. We launched the biggest platform for women in Chicago. We were the it fashion, food blog in the city. We had a hundred thousand local readers. And from the outside we were this really sparkly, successful business but on the inside we were very dysfunctional, toxic, and weren't really succeeding. And it was our first business. We were so young. I was 26, she was 24. I didn't know her that well when we went into business which is I think a common mistake people make when they meet someone they really love and they have that spark and then they get into business together and then they're like, "Oh my gosh. Business is like running a family and a marriage. It's such an intense relationship."

Jessica Zweig: And we really didn't know each other and so we just made a ton of mistakes. We opened up a ton of credit cards. She was managing the books, I was doing sales. We were so young, so green, so inexperienced and seven years later we had $75,000 worth of debt and I wanted to leave the business and she didn't. And so, I was willing to settle for my half of the debt and she was very, very upset with me for leaving and it was a really tough decision. I loved her, I loved the business. I mean, we were like sisters. We had a love, hate. After seven years of building something great with someone you do have a relationship. So it wasn't an easy thing but I think in many ways she looked at me like I was abandoning her but I was really just following my truth.

Jessica Zweig: It had run its course. I couldn't do it anymore. And I did want to clean up my side of the street and pay off my 50% of the debt with a payment plan because that's all I could afford. And I got a lawyer and she got hers and it just got really, really, really ugly and it took about seven, nine months for us to settle it. And I ended up paying 50% of the debt in one fell swoop and I had very little money in savings. I ended up having no choice but to just clear it and start from scratch. Bobbi Rebell: When you look back were there red flags that you should have spotted in the relationship, in the business in terms of the skills that you both brought?

Jessica Zweig: From day one. I mean, there were massive red flags. I think I realized three months in just how different we were but we were young and we were so naive and we both really loved this business. This magazine Cheeky was our baby. And so I didn't want to give it up and she didn't want to give it up and at the core there was a magic connection with us. We wouldn't have created what we created if there wasn't that synergistic spark. And we both loved each other to a degree which was what made it so difficult.

Jessica Zweig: But there were red flags and it was honestly one of the most toxic relationships of my life. I mean, we were together for seven years and we were water and vinegar. We were just totally different people. And I'm not saying I was better or she was worse, we were just different. I've come to so much peace and love and honestly forgiveness for myself first in the way that I showed up in that relationship as much as her and how she showed up in the relationship which I think has really been a huge key to me soaring in the last few years because I really did my own work.

Jessica Zweig: I think it's so easy to point fingers at people when they burn us or they hurt us or they come after us. There's that expression when you point one finger at someone, I mean do it, you're pointing three back at yourself. So you really do have to look at yourself in any sort of situation but when it comes to money it's especially loaded and I could still be angry, I could still be bitter, I could still be resentful. I don't feel any of those feelings. And it was the greatest learning lesson of my life. I applied all of those mistakes, all of those failures to simply be and simply be is so successful and it wouldn't have been unless I had that seven year chapter and run of making all of those mistakes.

Jessica Zweig: So, I think that everything happens for a reason and I feel like the debt and the brokenness has made me value money today and cherish money and respect money and operate my money with so much more reverence and care than I think I would have if I hadn't reached that rock bottom. So, everything happens for a reason and divine order. It's happening for you not to you even though it can really feel the opposite in the moment. I wouldn't be who I am without that business and that failure.

Bobbi Rebell: Can you me a specific example of something that happened that highlighted your differences? It doesn't have to be your biggest fight or something but something especially money related that you just never agreed on.

Jessica Zweig:I think we were both pretty irresponsible with the way we spent the business's money. I really wanted to grow it and scale it and exit. I wanted to be that type of entrepreneur and she wanted it to be a more lifestyle business. If you're going to go into business with anyone whether it's a business partner or someone on your team or your leadership team to really understand those nuances and get everyone on the same page. Because it sets the foundation for the type of business and the rate in which you want to grow and how you want to operate and who you want to do business with so, so much. And we just didn't have the skills. We were so young. We didn't have the tools to talk about money and business at that level. We were green as grass. So, of course it netted out the way that we netted out. And we also were really done when we opened up our credit cards. She was the personal guarantor on the credit cards. It was just mistake, after mistake, after mistake.

Bobbi Rebell: Yeah. I love that you're talking about the fact that it is so hard to talk about money and it sounds like you guys didn't have a lot of talks about money and how you were going to structure your firm and how you were going to fund it before you started it. What is the lesson for our listeners as we put it all in context?

Jessica Zweig: Communicate. Be willing to have hard conversations. Money makes people funny. I also would say, don't ever talk about money in those conversations on email or on Slack or even on the phone. We unfortunately can't get together in person so if you Zoom, Zoom, but in-person is best. Having sacred space around conversations, honoring this is uncomfortable, honoring this is important, honoring this is going to make or break our business if we don't talk about it. And we just didn't communicate. Our communication style was so dysfunctional and broken and I think actually way, way up and make the right decision to partner with the right people in the first place. Because if you do then you won't need to ceremonialize these conversations so much because you'll already be in the same vibration, in the same page. And yet money makes people funny no matter what and so you really have to recognize that in yourself and in the others and bring as much consciousness and integrity to those kinds of negotiations, conversations, whatnot.

Bobbi Rebell: I could talk to you forever about this but I want to get your everyday money tip because it's something that I am already implementing for 2021 and that is having accountability, having an accountability partner. Talk about that.

Jessica Zweig: Yeah. So I actually write about this in my book. I have a whole chapter on accountability partners. Because attempting to do anything great and big and significant for your life you need someone to keep you accountable. You need someone to hold you in check. So whether that's writing a book, launching a business, saving money, paying off your debt, having a partner in it is I think the key to the success of it all. And to be frank with you, I'm very fortunate. So the pandemic disrupted my business in a lot of beautiful ways, in a lot of challenging ways. And one of the things I did is I applied for the PPP. I had a finance team at the time that I didn't really fully like, they were fine, and they wanted to charge me $10,000 to apply for the PPP loan which I thought was the most counterintuitive request I've ever seen because we were a small business going into a pandemic applying for a loan and they wanted to charge us money.

Jessica Zweig: And so, I brought in my husband who is a financial advisor, as well as you are. And his business had kind of slowed down, he couldn't go out and network, we were quarantining. And he's like, "Jess, I'll help you with the PPP." He took one look at my finance team and was like, "Dude, I can do this better." And so I fired my finance team and I hired my husband. And my husband and I have always obviously been partners and accountable to each other because we're married but bringing him into my business...

Jessica Zweig: He's now my CFO, he helps me run the shop, saving money, ensuring that our P and L's are always balanced, making sure we're net profitable. Having someone that I trust, obviously I trust no one more than my own husband but he has really allowed me to fly as the CEO because I know that he's got things covered. And we operate like a legit finance CFO to CEO. We take weekly meetings. He has an agenda. We run through every money in money out, hiring, investments, savings. We don't have any debt in our business. It's a really powerful person, obviously it's my own husband. But if you can have someone to pulse check you, to support you, to believe in you, to honestly be able to see the forest from the trees more than you can in your own project or business or money endeavor that is so key.

Jessica Zweig: And then another thing that I have done that has really allowed me to get out of debt and save money and feel really, really peaceful and abundant and my husband has helped me with this is we've set up an account. I call it my island account and it's a bank account we can only put money in. And if I needed to take money out I'd have to drive all the way across town in the worst hours, whatever. It's my island account. I can only send money to it, it can only grow. And I'm stacking my cheddar as my accountant once told me and my husband helps me ensure that money is being sent to that account every single month and that we're totally able to send that level of money over to that account and that's really grown our savings. My husband and I sleep well at night because of it.

Jessica Zweig: And so those are the key hacks that having my husband and having that account has changed honestly my financial wellbeing more than my finances but more of my financial wellbeing, which I think is key to vibrating at that level of abundance and attracting more.

Bobbi Rebell: That's such great advice. There's also a lot more great advice and I'm picking up your book now even though I know we're on audio and your book, okay I'm going to read the title Be, with a period, A No Bullshit Guide to Increasing Your Self-Worth and Net Worth by Simply Being Yourself. And I love the yellow cover. Yellow became one of your themes in the book so it transcends so much about you and your sunny personality. Tell us briefly about the book.

Jessica Zweig: So the book is a personal branding book. It's going to walk you through my trademark methodology of how to build your platform, the platform of you. Whether you work for yourself, or you work for someone else, or you want to one day work for yourself, having an understanding of what makes you you is an invaluable asset that you can take with you no matter what your job title is. That's number one. It's going to teach you tactically step-by-step how to do that from messaging, to strategy, to content, to social media, to PR.

Jessica Zweig: However, it is a personal empowerment book in fact disguised as a business book. Because I think at the core most people feel afraid to do that and to put themselves out there. And I say that my book is the permission slip and the reminder that you are worthy to be seen and to shine and to have everything you ever want. And it's my own journey in fact as well and my uncovering that truth for myself. And so, I'm right along with you throughout the whole book and you're going to take away so much tactical knowledge but at the end of the day I hope it inspires people to stop playing small and stop apologizing for their authentic amazingness. And that's what my book Be is about.

Bobbi Rebell: One of the recommendations in the book is to keep your social media and all of your public identifying names, et cetera, very consistent. So let's end with you telling us where people can find you on all of the social media because I know you keep it easy.

Jessica Zweig: I walk the talk as I say I drink my own Kool-Aid. So yes I am at Jessica Zweig on Twitter, on Facebook, on Instagram, on LinkedIn, jessicazweig.com. You can also go to simplybeagency.com which is my company's website and find me. I'm really, really, really easy to find. I'm out there. So please come and say hi.

Bobbi Rebell: Perfect. Thank you so much for joining us.

Jessica Zweig: Thank you so much for having me. This was amazing.

Bobbi Rebell: Here we go my friends Financial Grownup tip number one, some of the greatest business and financial success stories come from people who have survived toxic business relationships like Jessica, and like Jessica they use the lessons from those crushing and painful experiences to thrive in their next venture. This past week the dating app Bumble went public and its founder Whitney Wolfe-Herd started Bumble in 2014 after she very publicly left the dating app Tinder where she was a co-founder after a breakup with another co-founder. And she's talked about it a lot, it was a toxic relationship for sure. She is now the youngest female CEO to take her company public and worth over a billion dollars. What a great story.

Bobbi Rebell: Financial Grownup tip number two, so many of us are having trouble staying on track to meet our goals during the pandemic in part because it feels like no one's watching. I mean, after all we can and do literally work in our pajamas, certainly the off-camera part. We can quite literally take a nap between meetings. So it is time, get an accountability partner like Jessica. Get someone who will be committed to you and to whom you will also be committed to keeping on track. And if you both aren't doing that well break up fast and find another accountability partner who's a better fit. Nothing wrong with taking it a little easy but this more quiet time will come to an end and the opportunity to get your goals without so many distractions should not go to waste.

Bobbi Rebell: One way to get motivated, get out of those PJ's. Realistically, I know we aren't getting dressed up but have some fun with your pandemic wardrobe. That's what I know I needed when I came up with a concept for Grownup Gear it is all about celebrating wherever we are in our journey to being grown ups which never really ends let's be honest. Check out the designs on my website, bobbirebell.com. Click on shop or just go directly to grownupgear.com. And please be in touch. DM me what you want more of on this podcast. I love your feedback. I put discount codes for Grownup Gear on my Instagram, which by the way is Bobbi Rebell one. And we did just start a Grownup Gear Instagram. We don't have a lot of followers so please come check it out. That's at @GrownupGear on Instagram.

Bobbi Rebell: So big thanks to Jessica Zweig, author of Be, A No Bullshit Guide to Increasing You Self-Worth and Your Net Worth By Simply Being Yourself. Everyone check out the book and thanks again to Jessica for helping us all be financial grownups. Financial Grownup with Bobbi Rebell is edited and produced by Steve Stewart and is a BRK Media production.

HSA's, aka Health Savings Accounts are getting a lot of buzz - because they can be awesome. Here is the Financial Grownup Guide to 10 things you need to know to find out if HSA’s are right for you. 

Here are the 10 things you must know about them and why you need to find out asap if they are right for you.

1. What are they. Health savings accounts are tax advantaged savings accounts- that means you put in pre-tax money- that can be used to pay for medical related expenses. 

2. Love paying no taxes- how much can I put in? That changes every year. For 2019 you can put in up to $3500- and families can put in up to $7000. If you are over 50 you can do a catch up of an additional $1000. 

3. What kinds of things can I use it for? Generally the things you would get re-imbursed for by insurance once you use up the deductible- so NOT the bi-weekly premiums you are paying but YES to doctor visit you went to or a medication that wasn’t reimbursed because, you have a high deductible that you haven’t met yet.  

4. Am I eligible? You have to have - another acronym here- an HDHP- that is a High Deductible Health Plan. That is defined by the IRS as a deductible of $1350 for an individual and $2700 for a family. You also have to have some hefty out of picket amounts: $6,750 for individuals and $13,500 for families. You also can’t have another medical plan. You can’t be enrolled in Medicare. And you can’t be a dependent on someone else’s tax return. 

5. How do I actually set it up- this can be done through your employer- right along with the health care plan- which is usually a good idea because some companies will also put money into the account for you- and we all love ‘free’ money. According to Mercer the average company contributes almost $700. That money is not included in your gross income.  it can also be set up at some financial institutions. 

6. What does it cost: Many financial institutions do charge fees but they are often waived if you can maintain a minimum balance. I will leave some links in the show notes of great articles that rank financial institutions by things like fee structure from places like Morningstar and the College Investor- which is run by financial grownup Robert Farrington- you guys should make sure to check out his great episode. Also with financial institutions you can put in after tax money - and then deduct it from your income.

7. What if I don’t use it all?  This is my # favorite fact about HSA’s - you get to keep the money. it’s your money. So it rolls over until forever. Even if you later GO on medicare and can’t contribute, you can use it to pay premiums there. So good. BY the way- FSA- flexible spending- it is use it or lose it at the end of the year - big difference here. 

8. What if I leave my job? No worries- HSA’s are portable.

9. Explain the investing thing. The money is invested and the earnings, assuming they are used for eligible medical expenses, remain tax free. 

10. What’s the catch? The big catch is that if you think you are going to have big medical expenses, or you won’t have the cash to actually save and fund the HSA- you might want to consider a lower deduct-able health plan- it’s safer and you won’t get hit so hard with high medical bills. You can still do the flexible spending account.. 

EPISODE LINKS

Here are some resources to find out more about fees associated with HSA’s

https://www.morningstar.com/blog/2018/11/27/hsa-spending-account.html

https://www.morningstar.com/blog/2018/11/12/top-hsa-providers.html

https://thecollegeinvestor.com/22222/best-hsa/

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/07/your-money/health-savings-accounts-morningstar.html

https://www.doughroller.net/insurance/health/the-best-hsa-accounts/

Check out The College Investors’ Robert Farrington’s episode

Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. All opinions remain my own.

After ditching her first job at CNBC to move to the west coast for her boyfriend, Kalika Yap found herself dumped, out of work and homeless. But her determination and willpower quickly lifted her fortunes as she built a multi-pronged entrepreneurial venture starting with the explosion of the internet economy. 

In Kalika's money story you will learn:

• Moving for love isn't always the best idea, but it sometimes works out for the best anyway

• Even if you don't like where you are in life, you always have the chance to make your life better

• If you want to learn something fast, teach it to someone else

• Sometimes relying on your gut can lead to amazing things

In Kalika’s money lesson you will learn:

• Listen to your intuition

• Pick up a book

• Work to be financially self-sufficient

In Kalika's everyday money tip you will learn:

• Pick a password that is related to your goals. By typing in your goal over and over again, you will always remember what you are striving to achieve

In My Take you will learn:

• Never take your eye off the prize - which is you and your future

• Put down the phone and open a book and take a break from the pressures of the world to allow new ideas to come to you.

Check out Kalika's website -

kalika.com

Links to Kalika’s companies

• Citrus Studios

• Luxe Link

• The Waxing Co

• Orange & Bergamot

Follow Kalika!

• Instagram: @kalikayap

• Linked In: @kalikanacionyap

• Twitter: @kalika

• Facebook: @kalikayap

Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. All opinions remain my own.

Transcription

Kalika Yap:
My four-year college boyfriend had moved out to California to work at Frank Gehry's architect firm, so I wanted to join him. Joined him three weeks after I got there, he broke up with me so that he could date the receptionist and I didn't have a place to live. He dumped me at this internet café, that was the only place I knew where to go and I became friends with the owners. And one of the owners said, "Hey, well, you know, I have space in our two-bedroom condo. You can sleep on the foot of one of the second bedrooms, if you want."

Bobbi Rebell:
You're listening to Financial Grownup, with me, Certified Financial Planner, Bobbi Rebell, author of How to Be a Financial Grownup. And you know what? Being a grownup is really hard, especially when it comes to money. But it's okay, we're going to get there together. I'm going to bring you one money story from a financial grownup, one lesson, and then my take on how you can make it your own. We got this.

Bobbi Rebell:
Hey, financial grownup friends. There is nothing wrong with putting love first, but sometimes things don't work out and we have to pick up the pieces. Not just of our heart, but also our finances. Kalika Yap did all that and so much more. She now runs a number of digital marketing ventures, some smaller IRL businesses, and has invented a device to keep handbags clean and off the floor. It's really cool, we'll talk about that. We get the scoop on all of it from this incredibly inspiring entrepreneur. Like all of our guests, Kalika is a high achiever, to say the least.

Bobbi Rebell:
And for those of you new to the show, welcome. That is what we do here at Financial Grownup, we talk to people who have made it and who we can learn from. And as is the case with Kalika Yap, these wonderful guests candidly reveal their challenges and money experiences so we can all benefit. And we do it all in about 15 minutes, because you're busy and we never want you to be able to not fit us into your day. And with that, let's get to Kalika Yap and find out how in fact she became this incredible role model. Here is Kalika Yap.

Bobbi Rebell:
Hey, Kalika Yap. You're a financial grownup, welcome to the podcast.

Kalika Yap:
Thank you so much.

Bobbi Rebell:
You are a serial entrepreneur and author, and we could take the whole podcast to go through your entire resume, but among your businesses are Citrus Studios, Orange and Bergamot, Luxe Link, which I'm fascinated with and we're going to circle back to that later. And you're an author, The Little Brand Book, which you have a co-author, Erika Brechtel. Am I saying her name correctly?

Kalika Yap:
Yes. And I also own a waxing salon in Honolulu.

Bobbi Rebell:
Awesome, you're into everything that we care about.

Kalika Yap:
Yeah.

Bobbi Rebell:
That's awesome. Well, I'm so happy to have you here and we're going to talk more about that in a few minutes, but I am really curious about the money story that you brought because you actually started your career on the East Coast because you had graduated from New York University.

Kalika Yap:
Right.

Bobbi Rebell:
You left the job for love, which is great, but then, somehow, you ended up across the country and homeless, working for under the table, six dollars an hour in an internet café. What happened and how did you turn it around?

Kalika Yap:
So My four-year college boyfriend had moved out to California to work at Frank Gehry's architect firm, so I wanted to join him. Joined him three weeks after I got there, he broke up with me so that he could date the receptionist and I didn't have a place to live, I didn't-

Bobbi Rebell:
And wait, you'd been together for four years.

Kalika Yap:
Yes, yeah.

Bobbi Rebell:
So it's not like you just moved out there on a whim. And you gave up your job.

Kalika Yap:
Yes. I was working at CNBC at the time and quite my job as a tape producer, moved out to California to be with him and try to find a job and [inaudible 00:03:57] I thought that we would get married.

Kalika Yap:
He dumped me at this internet café, that was the only place I knew where to go. So I would take the bus from Hermosa Beach, where I was living at the time, and would go to this internet café every single day because I didn't know what to do. And I became friends with the owners, and one of the owners said, "Hey, well, you know, I have space in our two-bedroom condo. You can sleep on the foot of one of the second bedrooms, if you want." So basically I didn't have a place to live, I crashed there for many weeks. They gave me a job making lattes and zucchini bread, for six dollars, under the table, while I was collecting unemployment.

Bobbi Rebell:
Oh, my goodness. Okay, so then what actually happens? I mean, how long did you do that for? What was it like? How did you then move into entrepreneurship?

Kalika Yap:
My mom and my grandmother were both teachers, and they said that if you want to learn something fast, teach it. And so while I was there, I created these internet workshops and they ended up being sponsored by a little-known company then, called Yahoo. I saw that they were sponsoring a whole bunch of workshops at Harvard and so I reached out to them and they-

Bobbi Rebell:
Right, because your background was in media.

Kalika Yap:
In media, right. And so I wanted to get more information and learn about the internet. And all my friends who were journalists, they were working at The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Today Show, they thought it was completely crazy, they thought it was completely nuts. And so I got the website kalika.com and I was like the brunt of all their jokes when I went to go visit them, and they just thought that it was the most ridiculous thing that I was getting into the internet. And I was trying to tell them like, "Hey, you should get an email address. You should really look into the internet." I think at the time there were only two websites that I was familiar with, it was just Amazon and Yahoo, and-

Bobbi Rebell:
What year was this?

Kalika Yap:
1996.

Bobbi Rebell:
1996.

Kalika Yap:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Bobbi Rebell:
So there was not really any news on the internet, that wasn't happening. What did you see that other people did not?

Kalika Yap:
I think at that point you realized that your intuition really can guide you. And because I was no longer distracted by a boyfriend, I was no longer distracted by the life in New York, I was just very quiet. And I started doing yoga as well at that time and got into meditation, is you become very clear about what you think is going to happen, and it was so clear for me. I get these intuition things even now today, I feel like some of the things that I see, these trends, really are three years ahead. That's really what it was, is I relied on my gut. I find that when I interview entrepreneurs or mentor entrepreneurs, when they have a strong gut it really can lead them the right way.

Bobbi Rebell:
I love that. So what happened next? You start producing this content for Yahoo.

Kalika Yap:
They sponsored these workshops and them from there, The Getty was looking for someone who had visual experience, and this was, again, in 1996, 1997, and I beat out a whole bunch of people with masters degrees and PhDs, because I already had six months of curriculum where I was teaching What is the Internet, The History of Internet, What is Chat. It was really quite fascinating. So I got a job at the J. Paul Getty Trust working at the LA Culture Net, which was a collaborative initiative project with the President's Office, the arts and education department in the Getty, and that's where I started my career.

Kalika Yap:
When I started getting paid more doing my web stuff than getting paid my annual salary, I thought that it was probably a good idea. And the Getty became my first client because I was doing so much. I went above and beyond my regular job, I started teaching workshops there. So I was considered, I guess, a web producer, web editor. I was updating the site, doing designs, just for arts department, but I went above and beyond. I started doing these search engine optimization round tables, I started doing all these workshops, teaching all these people at the museum, at the art institute, at [inaudible 00:07:41]. I just went above and beyond everything I was doing. And then when I left, there was, I guess, a hole. And so they hired me back and I started doing all their exhibition websites, we ended up doing their intranet. We did a lot of work for the Getty and it was incredible working with them, and I still work with them today.

Bobbi Rebell:
What is your takeaway for our listeners from all that?

Kalika Yap:
Listen to your intuition, I think is one. And also to pick up a book. I mean, the book that changed my life was The Energy of Money by Dr. Maria Nemeth. There, she talks about cleaning up your unfinished business with money. And for me it was paying back my parents because they had supported me during college and I had racked up all these credit card bills and basically made them pay for it, racked up all these parking tickets, basically made them pay for it, and realized that if I didn't understand what my values were, nothing could be successful for me. So one of my values is having integrity and having integrity is not making everyone else pay for your bills.

Kalika Yap:
So even though they didn't provide me with any type of invoice, I went back and I paid them for every single parking ticket, every single credit card bill, and I paid back all my student loans. I didn't have very much money, working at a full-time job, but I made it happen. I would shop at these secondhand vintage stores, and I would just save up my money and pay all my dues back. And from there I think I felt really free and I haven't looked back since.

Bobbi Rebell:
What is your everyday money tip? I love this because it's simple and yet it's going to enhance everyone's day-to-day focus.

Kalika Yap:
So every day we put in our password for any type of app, whatever we do, and so my password is my money goal. I put down how much money I want to make and it just reminds me of what my money goals are.

Bobbi Rebell:
So I don't want you to reveal any passwords that you currently have, but in the past what would be an example of how you would come up with a password?

Kalika Yap:
My first password was 4$million and I was able to surpass that after typing in that password many, many times. And then from there I just started increasing the number as I wanted to increase my revenue.

Bobbi Rebell:
Awesome. And it doesn't have to be literally just the number, it could be other kinds of goals.

Kalika Yap:
Right. It could be clarity, it could be focus, it could be ease, it could be grace. It could be a word that your intention for the year.

Bobbi Rebell:
Awesome. All right, let's talk more about your businesses. First of all, we went through the list of them. I don't want to ask you to pick favorites because I know they're all your babies, but I want to talk ... Because we have the holiday season coming up and I think it's really important for people to have good karma. There's one that you think is most focused on that.

Kalika Yap:
Right. So Luxe Link, I have the worldwide patents on purse hook that I invented. And I invented it because my grandmother always said don't put your purse on the floor. And while there were all these other hooks that look like actually J-hooks that have been around since the 1920s, I thought creating a hook that was a little bit more compact and easy to carry would be a great product to produce. So Luxe Link keeps your purse off the floor and it's really fantastic.

Bobbi Rebell:
Well, it's very elegant. It looks really pretty and it's nice because it's actually portable, so you could keep it with you as opposed to a lot of places they have them but then they don't and you end up with your purse on the floor, which is never fun.

Kalika Yap:
Right.

Bobbi Rebell:
Especially when you spend money on things. It's important, if we do invest in quality products, that we do take care of them.

Kalika Yap:
Right.

Bobbi Rebell:
So I think that's definitely a good idea to always be careful with the things that you invest in. So tell us more about where people can find you.

Kalika Yap:
My website, kalika.com, K-A-L-I-K-A dot com, has links to all my business. It has a link to my podcast, I have the EO Wonder podcast, which is for women entrepreneurs primarily. And I'm also on Wikipedia, I have a page on Wikipedia with links as well.

Bobbi Rebell:
Which is great. Thank you so much, Kalika.

Kalika Yap:
Thank you so much, Bobbi.

Bobbi Rebell:
Okay, my friends. Let's break this down. Financial grownup tip number one, mixed feelings about moving for love, but in Kalika's case she didn't have a plan for her own career. So that's my advice here. Not that you can't make compromises to make a relationship work, but never take your eye off the prize, which is you and your future of course. Even if they had stayed together, she had no specific financial plan for her career at the time that she moved. Financial grownup tip number two, read. Kalika took the time to open up a good old-fashioned book and it really inspired her. I have a lot of great authors on this program whose books I highly recommend, but whatever draws you in and inspires you. I hate to say it, but put down the phone, open a book and shut out the world for a little bit. It will open your mind and help you create and imagine your own opportunities. Maybe things you never though would interest you.

Bobbi Rebell:
All right, DM your favorite inspiring books. They could be business related but they don't have to be. On Instagram at bobbirebell1, on Twitter @bobbierebell, and you can email us always at hello@financialgrownup.com. And thanks to entrepreneur Kalika Yap for her wisdom today and helping us all get one step closer to being financial grownups.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial Grownup with Bobbi Rebell is edited and produced by Steve Stewart and is a BRK Media production.

Serial Entrepreneur Peter Shankman, who also hosts the Faster than Normal podcast and wrote a book by the same name, talks about taking calculated risks like skydiving, business strategies that have taken his side hustles into massive businesses like HARO, and the choices he’s made to build the life he not only wanted, but needed. 

In Peter’s money story you will learn:

-The type of risks to take in order to grow a business

-"Spending money to make money" is really a balancing act

-Peter's top three tips on how to handle going into debt

-How Peter feels about Las Vegas

In Peter’s money lesson you will learn:

-How to act on new business ideas

-Growing a business is a marathon not a sprint

-Tips to visualizing goals 

-Why Peter gets up at 4 AM every day

In Peter’s everyday money tip you will learn:

-Spoonbill.io is an app that shows you anyone that has updated their bio. 

-He suggests using the changes in status as an opening to reach out and connect

Learn more about Peter!!

Check out his FasterthanNormal.com website

Get more info about his mastermind group at Shankminds.com

His website is Shankman.com

Connect with Peter on social

Instagram @petershankman

Twitter @petershankman

---

Transcription

Peter Shankman:
Going into debt for things that you love or things that you believe in isn't necessarily a bad thing. And I encourage people to go after what they love, but the question becomes, "Are you going after something you love and still able to do it in such a way? What happens if it doesn't work?"

Bobbie Rebell:
You are Listening to you Financial Grownup with me, certified financial planner, Bobbi Rebell, author of How To Be A Financial Grownup, and you know what? Being a grown-up is really hard, especially when it comes to money, but it's okay. We're going to. Get there together. I'm going to bring you one money story from a financial grownup, one lesson and then my take on how you can make it your own. We got this.

Bobbie Rebell:
Hey, Financial Grownup fans. That was entrepreneur and ADHD Advocate Peter Shankman. He talks fast, but pay close attention. He's worth it. Quick. Welcome to, everyone. Thanks for being here. We keep it simple. Spending about 15 minutes talking with high achievers, sharing there are many stories giving us insight into how they became such high achievers. If you like what you hear, please do all the things, subscribe, rate, review, take a screenshot, share it on social, tag me so I can thank you and tell a friend you care about.

Bobbie Rebell:
Let's talk about Peter Shankman. He does a lot and largely credits his ADHD, which stands for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder with being key to his success, which is why he wrote a book about it called Faster Than Normal, hosts, a podcast by that name, and now has the Shank Minds Community. He also wrote a bunch of other books. He was in PR. You might be familiar with the Geek Factory where he started a little side hustle to help journalists like me called appropriately help a reporter out or HARO. It's become very well-known and it's still a really big deal after he sold it. Also, he's an angel investor and he does marathons, Ironman triathlons, and he does a ton of skydiving like close to 500 jumps. Peter is a big deal. Let's get to him. Here is Peter Shankman.

Bobbie Rebell:
Hey, Peter Shankman, you're a financial grownup. Welcome to the podcast.

Peter Shankman:
Well, that's questionable, but thank you. It's good to be here.

Bobbie Rebell:
And congratulations on all your recent success, including your book Faster Than Normal, which is also a podcast, and a mastermind group, and that follows on the heels of many entrepreneurial successes. The most dear to my heart, of course, is HARO, help a reporter out, which you guys sold, but certainly, you have made such a name with that, so congratulations on all that.

Peter Shankman:
Thank you. I've gotten lucky. Good times.

Bobbie Rebell:
And speaking of your entrepreneurial success, that brings us to your money story, which has to do with going into debt in part for success. Nothing you necessarily regret, but something that ties into your ADHD, which you've talked about, and you talk about so much publicly. That's actually been something that you've leveraged as an entrepreneur, but it also created debt.

Peter Shankman:
When somebody with ADHD comes up with the idea for a company, which is what they do a lot.

Bobbie Rebell:
You've had many companies.

Peter Shankman:
I have. The premise is like, "All right, I wonder if I could do this better," and like three hours later I have some have started a company, and I'm not really sure how. The problem there is that it's not necessarily cheap to do. And for me, I got lucky in the respect that when I started my first one back in the 90s, which was the Geek Factory, a public relations firm, I did it in such a way that I created an idea for this tee-shirt. The movie Titanic was coming out, and I had this idea that I could sell tee-shirts in times square, because there had to be other people that hated the movie, as well. So I went into Time Square with 500 tee-shirts that I spent my rent money on tee-shirts that read, "It sank, get over it." I thought I could sell maybe 150 in Times Square and make my money back.

Peter Shankman:
And I sold like 500 in six hours. I cleared like five grand, and I cleared about 100 grand on the web. But that was a risky thing, because that was my rent money. If I didn't have that, I didn't do well, I was kind of screwed. Right? So it's those things where you come up with this idea, and you see what happens, and you risk it, but going into debt for things that you love or things that you believe in isn't necessarily a bad thing. And I encourage people to go after what they love. But the question becomes, are you going after something you love and still able to do it in such a way, what happens if it doesn't work? And there are a lot of people don't think like that.

Bobbie Rebell:
And to some degree, even though it was your rent money and, in your head, of course, that's a huge amount of money. You later made even bigger bets.

Peter Shankman:
I definitely made bigger bets. Here's the thing, there are two types of risks. There's blind risk and there's calculated risk. And I'm a skydiver, right? I have close to 500 jumps. I own my own gear and the whole thing and if I thought that I was going to die every time I jumped out of a plane, I wouldn't do it. Right. The key is, is that I believe that the training I have, and the gear I have, I keep it clean. I keep it in good shape. I know what I'm doing. I've learned how to do it, and so if I thought I was going to die everything I jumped I wouldn't jump. So I take calculated risks and calculated risks, while they're still risky, inherently called risks. The end of the world is not coming, so I'm not going to be like, "Okay, I'm going to start this. If it doesn't work, I'm homeless and living on the street."

Bobbie Rebell:
So tell us about HARO.

Peter Shankman:
HARO was a company. I built the connected journalists with sources all around the world. For me it was, "Okay, I'm going to start this on my own using a mailing list and paying a kid, who I know, a 100 bucks to build me the cheapest website known to man," because all you really needed to do was capture email addresses, and I did it. What wound up happening was that as it started growing I was able to ... I never planned on making money at it, to begin with. I planned on doing it sort of for the sake of doing it, for fun and it would help journalists. It would help my friends, and it would be good Karma and it wound up blowing up in such a way that it started generating revenue without my really expecting it to. But on the flip side, as it got bigger, I had to spend more money to keep it alive. And so it was that balancing, because look, I'm not an MBA. For me, it was a balancing act of how do I do that? And that was a lesson I learned on the fly.

Bobbie Rebell:
So what exactly happened? You went into debt unexpectedly for that.

Peter Shankman:
I went to debt unexpected. Not a tremendous amount, but certainly enough where I'm sitting there going, "Hmm, this is interesting." I live in New York City, right? I was renting an apartment at the time, in midtown Manhattan, which was not cheap, still isn't. And I've since bought one, which is even less cheaper or more expensive, but it gets to the point where it's like, "Okay, am I still able to do this and what's my runway like?" I think that's what a lot of people don't think about. They think, "Okay, I'm going to go into debt for this." You got to look two, three, four, eight, 10, 12 months in advance, or 12 into the future. How is that going to look in 12 months? How's the runway that I'm on right now? So the plane going down the runway at some point you need to take off or slam on the brakes.

Bobbie Rebell:
What was your runway?

Peter Shankman:
I think for the first four months that I was building HARO, there was absolutely no revenue coming in, because again, it was just me and a mailing list, right? It wasn't costing that much, but HARO got picked up by a newspaper. It got picked up by the New York Times. It got picked up, Seth Godin wrote about it, so all of a sudden we were getting thousands of new members per day, and I was using a mailing list service that based their charges on how many members we had. Right? So the more emails I was sending out every day, that's great at building the site, the more it was costing me.

Peter Shankman:
I think I went from like at one point 100 bucks a month in mailing lists charges to 2000 bucks a month in mailing list charges. Right. And so something has to happen here. At the same time people started calling me, said, "Hey, we use HARO all the time. We open every single email, do you accept advertising on it?" And so all of a sudden I was able to start selling ads against HARO. And my premise was I'll sell ads for whatever the cost of everything I'm having to pay for is. Again, wasn't even trying to turn a profit.

Bobbie Rebell:
Why? Why were you not trying to turn a profit?

Peter Shankman:
Because I still was running a public relations firm and at the time I was still running a PR firm. My premise was just, "Okay, I'll just keep doing this and building it." And then one day, it kind of hit me like, "You know what? This is a lot more profitable than the PR firm. This can make a lot more money than the PR firm. I should put all my effort into this." So I started shutting down my clients, giving them to other companies, things like that. And that's when I realized, "Okay, there's a lot of money to be made here."

Bobbie Rebell:
Talk about the connection between ADHD, and your experience as an entrepreneur.

Peter Shankman:
You need to be very aware. Like I said, when you only have two speeds when you're ADHD, so you need to be very aware that the ideas that come into your head, "Hey, this seems like a great idea. Let's do this," right. Might not necessarily be a great idea, or they might sound like an awesome idea, but you have to make sure that you actually can afford to do said idea, right? It's one thing to go into debt on a brilliant idea. It's another thing to say, "Hey, this is interesting. Let's go to bed." So the question is, is it going to work? If you don't have a plan, you're going to get in trouble,

Bobbie Rebell:
But you didn't have a plan at HARO. Really?

Peter Shankman:
I also didn't know I was at ADHD at the time.

Bobbie Rebell:
Okay, fair enough.

Peter Shankman:
It wasn't until about five years later that I realized all this stuff that I do has an actual name for it, and so for instance, now when I go to Vegas to give a keynote, anywhere in the world that I keynote, my contract basically says, "I'll keynote, you'll pay me, except in Las Vegas," In Las Vegas, it says, "Client does not have to be on the ground from wheels down to wheels up for more than eight hours." And so I'll fly in at 6:00 AM do a 12:30 PM, keynote and be out on a 4:00 PM flight, because if I have to stay the night in Vegas, nothing good's going to come of that.

Bobbie Rebell:
So you didn't have the ADHD diagnosis when you started HARO. Looking back, are there things that you would have done differently had you known or are you grateful and it worked out that you did not know because that way you ... you really plowed into that very quickly. You basically had the idea and just did it.

Peter Shankman:
Yeah, three hours later it was launched. I mean, I'm thrilled by the way things happened because you know, I was able to realize, "Hey, this can actually work for me." But again, that point is you have to understand how your brain works and you have to understand sort of what works for you.

Bobbie Rebell:
You don't think you would've launched HARO had you had that fear that other people have, that fear of debt?

Peter Shankman:
Probably not. And the thing about me is that a lot of my, almost everything I've done, I can trace back to my ADHD, right? The premise of, "Huh, wonder what would happen if? This morning I was doing an open water swim with a friend of mine, 5:30 in the morning outside of Coney Island.

Bobbie Rebell:
Because you get up at four in the morning every day.

Peter Shankman:
Because I get up at four in the morning, right. I actually got up at 3:30 this morning, where I'm sitting at Coney island. We're looking at the water, I say, "Oh, it's really pretty. It's really nice. I wonder where we should go? Should we just do our normal regular swim?" And I look at a light, and there's a buoy, right? I'm like, "I wonder how far that buoy is?" And my friend and I, "Oh, that's probably not that far." And you know, then there's the Morgan Freeman announcer's voice going, "In fact, it was much further," so a mile and a half later we come back from the swim, nearly dead. That's why I'd have a wonderful financial advisor, I have a wonderful accountant whose job it is, is to protect me so that I don't do these stupid things.

Bobbie Rebell:
So what is the lesson for our listeners from this? Those who have ADHD and those who know of somebody who has ADHD because that's pretty much everybody.

Peter Shankman:
It is. I think the lesson is to understand yourself first and foremost, and once you understand yourself, don't put yourself into positions where you can get into that level of trouble. It doesn't mean don't take risks, but make sure, again, they're calculated risks is a big difference between doing something for the hell of doing yeah, whatever and taking a calculated risk.

Bobbie Rebell:
And as pertains to debt?

Peter Shankman:
Most definitely there is good debt, there's great debt. You know, owning a home is a great debt, but if you're making $135,000 a year, maybe buying a 2.7 million dollar home is not necessarily the best idea in the world. I would love those shows. House Hunters. You see these two people, "Yeah, my wife has a business where she combs the knots out of street dogs and I make artisanal pencils. Our budget is four million dollars?" What?

Bobbie Rebell:
So true.

Peter Shankman:
Try to live in your own life there and understand that at the end of the day, especially with finances, at the end of the day, the race is only with yourself and it's a marathon, it's not a sprint.

Bobbie Rebell:
For people with ADHD, any specific lessons to draw regarding taking on debt? Are they? Do they need to be more careful? I know you have a lot of checks and balances in place.

Peter Shankman:
Yeah. I think one of the best lessons I've learned. Anytime I want to buy something, whether I'm online, whether it's in person, I ask myself, I stop and I visualize, "Where's this thing going to go in my apartment? Where's it going? Because I have two bedroom apartment in New York City isn't that much. Where's it going to live? Where's it going to sit? How am I going to use it? Am I going to take it out of where it is or is it going to be too much of a pain to get it back in there? And I ask all these questions. That probably prevents me from, I'd say doing probably 60% of things I want to buy.

Peter Shankman:
The other thing I do is I keep a lot of the purchasing Apps off my phone. The same reason I don't put like food Apps on my phone where you can order food because it's just too easy to order crappy food, so I keep those off and if I want to order something I have to go to my computer, get on the web, and it's actually a process. If you make it a process, it's a little bit easier not to necessarily just blindly do it.

Bobbie Rebell:
All right, Peter, your everyday money tip is all about making sure you connect with people because that's how you're ultimately going to be successful. That goes back to your PR days and all the advice you've given people. What is your everyday money tip?

Peter Shankman:
I love a website called spoonbill.io. It's S-P-O-O-N-B-I-L-L-.I-O, and what it does is it shows you anyone who has updated their Twitter bio, right? So you want to keep an eye on that because if you're looking to talk to reporters, you're looking to talk to me, you find out immediately what they've done, the "Oh look, that person just changed where they work or whatever," and then you can shoot a note. "Hey, noticed that you changed your." It's a great way to keep in touch with people without coming across as too needy or too wanting. Just take a look just say, "Hey, I noticed that you just got a new job. Congratulations."

Bobbie Rebell:
Right. It gives you a reason to keep in touch. And it can be for business, it can be for friendship, all of which helps us live richer lives. So, Peter, tell us what's going on with you for the rest of 2018 into 2019 with Faster Than Normal and all your other projects.

Peter Shankman:
Well, Fast Than Normal is my baby. It's a wonderful website and podcast where we focus on ADHD and the fact that ADHD can be a gift, not a curse as long as you know how to use it, which is what we talked about here. I run a mastermind group with sort of the same premise for some entrepreneurs, smaller to midsize entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurship is lonely and you got to have people to talk to. You have people who understand what it's like to be an entrepreneur that's at shankminds.com. And we're a great group of people that meet virtually and then a couple times a year in person. What else am I doing? A lot of fun stuff. My entire life is at shankman.com, my last name. You can find me there and my email is petershankman.com, I'm @petershankman on all the socials. I'm happy to connect with anyone. I think it's fun.

Bobbie Rebell:
Love it, and you are great at keeping in touch and if people reach out to you it's pretty likely they're going to hear back, so thank you, Peter. You're really wonderful. We appreciate you being here.

Peter Shankman:
My pleasure. Always happy to help.

Bobbie Rebell:
Hey friends, here's my take. Financial Grownup tip number one, Peter has been successful because he took things that were unique to him that might have held them back, but instead he uses them as a superpower. Find your superpower. What other people may see as a challenge may, in fact, be your biggest asset. Take a time out one of these days and just think about it. Hit pause. What traits and themes keep rising? For Peter, it was things like risk-taking and moving forward with ideas before they were fully fleshed out, but that worked in his favor usually, or he recovered or the consequences weren't that bad.

Bobbie Rebell:
Financial Grownup tip Number two, Peter talked about reaching out to people when they had a change in job status and you were notified thanks to this App, so that's a great idea. I would add to that, that it is important to keep in touch with people when something maybe not so good happens like they lose a job or face a setback. People remember that. Even just calling to let them know you're aware of what's going on and you're there for them is going to be really meaningful and remembered.

Bobbie Rebell:
Okay, my friends, we're going to wrap. I thought about advocating, doing something big like Peter going skydiving, but you know what? It's not going to happen. I got to be honest, but if Peter has inspired you to skydive, I need to hear about it, so let me know. DM me my friends on Instagram. I am @bobbibebell1, at Twitter @bobbierebell. And find out more about the show, bobbyrebell.com/financialgrownup podcasts.

Bobbie Rebell:
Show notes same pattern every time, bobbierebell/.com/podcast/the guest's name. In this case, that forward slash has Peter Shankman after it. And thanks to Peter for being a great guest. I am staying on the ground. No skydiving for me, but you did get us all one step closer to being Financial Grownups.

Bobbie Rebell:
Financial Grownup with Bobbi Rebell is edited and produced by Steve Stewart and is a BRK media production.

High Fiving Dollars' Sarah Li Cain had a contract that said her company had to pay her medical costs, but when she got pregnant, she and her husband had to come up with a strategic plan to actually collect the cash they were owed. Plus her tips on how to make sure you get the luxuries you want in life, without feeling nickel and dime’d

In Sarah’s money story you will learn:

-The challenge Sarah faced when pregnant as a teacher in China

-How the healthcare system there required employees to pay upfront, and then fight to get re-imbursed

-The financial risk that created for Sarah and her colleagues

-How careful documentation helped to get her money back

-The technique Sarah used to negotiate with her employer and her boss for both her healthcare needs and those of her colleagues

In Sarah’s money lesson you will learn:

-That is is essential to read your contract when you take a job, and not assume it will provide things, even if it is the law.

-The importance of standing your ground when you are entitled to something. 

In Sarah’s every day money tip you will learn:

-Why she is willing to pay more for homes that have the amenities that are important to her and her family

-The importance of building in value-add activities and facilities into your home or community, so you don’t have to spend extra cash to have services and other things that you value but might not pay for on an individual basis. 

In My Take you will learn:

-The importance of documentation especially when you need to be re-imbursed by an employer

-The tools and apps I personally use for document management and scanning

-My take on lifestyle amenities where you live

-The crazy and outrageous amenities that may not be worth paying for in many cases

Episode Links

Learn more about Sarah at https://highfivingdollars.com/

Listen to her podcast with Garrett Philbin (from Be Awesome not Broke) Beyond the Dollar! https://highfivingdollars.com/podcast/

Follow Sarah Li Cain!

Twitter: @sarahlicain

Facebook https://www.facebook.com/highfivingdollars

Pinterest https://www.pinterest.com/sarahlicain/

 

The tools I use to  store and track documents are

Dropbox dropbox.com

 

Evernote evernote.com

The App I use to scan documents is Jotnot https://www.jotnot.com/

Here’s a fun article from curbed.com on The Most outrageous amenities in NYC apartments https://ny.curbed.com/2017/12/18/16743830/nyc-outrageous-apartment-amenities-2017

Here is one from Elledecor.com on over the top amenities

https://www.elledecor.com/life-culture/fun-at-home/g14031044/over-the-top-amenities-nyc/

And here is one from Streeteasy.com on What Building Amenities to New Yorkers Want Most?

https://streeteasy.com/blog/nyc-building-amenities-top-10-most-popular/

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Transcription

Sarah Li Cain:
I don't think they really thought it through if someone were to get pregnant because I chose to go with someone who was able to speak English because I don't speak Chinese and so they were pretty expensive. I think I racked up a total about $25,000.

Bobbi Rebell:
You're listening to Financial Grownup with me, certified financial planner, Bobbi Rebell, author of How to Be a Financial Grownup. And you know what? Being a grownup is really hard, especially when it comes to money. But it's okay. We're going to get there together. I'm going to bring you one money story from a financial grownup, one lesson, and then my take on how you can make it your own. We got this.

Bobbi Rebell:
Hey friends. That was holistic money coach Sarah Li Cain of the blog High Fiving Dollars and the podcast Beyond the Dollar, taking a stroll down memory lane to a financial experience she'd probably rather forget. But she got through it.

Bobbi Rebell:
Welcome everyone and thanks for taking the time to join us here at Financial Grownup. We keep the shows on the short side so you can squeeze it into your busy day. But if you have more time, or are commuting, they are also meant to be listened to a few at a time. So when you subscribe, make sure the settings are at auto download and you will get three episodes each week.

Bobbi Rebell:
Back to Sarah. Her story is truly a financial grownup one because it begins with the birth of her first child which is a big life transition in and of itself, without all the financial responsibilities that comes with it, and she had to deal with a lot of money headaches. Here is Sarah Li Cain.

Bobbi Rebell:
Sarah Li Cain, you're a financial grownup. Welcome to the podcast.

Sarah Li Cain:
Thank you so much for having me Bobbi. I'm a big fan.

Bobbi Rebell:
Oh thank you, and I am a huge fan of yours ever since we met a couple of years ago actually at FinCon, which is a conference for content creators, because you were behind High Fiving Dollar and now the new Beyond the Dollar podcast. So congratulations on all of your success.

Sarah Li Cain:
Thank you so much.

Bobbi Rebell:
You are a holistic money coach. You also as I mentioned are a financial writer, and you are also someone who has worked all over the world, which brings us to the money story that you brought with you to share because it has to do with the time that you spent in China and something momentous that happened while you were there. Tell us.

Sarah Li Cain:
Yes, so actually spent a total about eight years in China. So before I was a writer and a money coach I was a elementary school teacher at a bunch of different international schools. My very last job, my husband and I found out that were pregnant. The interesting thing was in my contract the employer actually didn't pay for healthcare. So it's the employer legally has to provide you with healthcare, and so instead of actually giving us health insurance he had a little clause at the bottom of the contract that basically said we will reimburse 100% of any healthcare cost that you incur.

Bobbi Rebell:
That sounds really good.

Sarah Li Cain:
Yeah, it does, except if you don't have the money upfront and pay for that, then it makes it very difficult. And so for some of my coworkers-

Bobbi Rebell:
So you had to front the money?

Sarah Li Cain:
Yes. For some of my coworkers it was very difficult for them, number one, the ones who have children, they had to cover all their healthcare cost, and number two, I remember one of my coworkers had ... It wasn't major surgery but it was fairly big. She actually [inaudible 00:03:28] having to borrow money to cover that, until the employer was willing to basically reimburse it.

Bobbi Rebell:
So wait. Was it a situation where you would have to pay out of pocket and then basically fight to get reimbursed?

Sarah Li Cain:
Yes, exactly. So as long you had the receipt in theory they were going to pay you back. I don't think they really thought it through if someone were to get pregnant because healthcare is fairly cheap in China, but I chose to go with someone who was able to speak English because I don't speak Chinese and so they were pretty expensive. So I think I racked up a total about $25,000 American, including the birth, including the prenatal and postnatal care.

Bobbi Rebell:
So you had to forward that money, you had to pay that, and then try to get reimbursed?

Sarah Li Cain:
Yeah. One thing I did try to do was as the receipts payments, so every month when I'd have my prenatal appointments I would just sent, forward the receipt to my ... the owner of the school. Then the principal and I sat down and I said, "Listen, you know this is going to get really expensive. I'm going forward the boss or the owner a big, big bill, probably at least 10 grand after all of my prenatal appointments. He's going to have to be very careful because he's going to make sure, like, he's going to have that money and give it me." The principal and I actually worked together and figured out a way to approach the owner and how we were ... She was going to help me get that. The principal was going to help me get that money back.

Bobbi Rebell:
Was the school which is almost an independent school that did not have big financial resources, was that part of the issue why you were worried they wouldn't have the money?

Sarah Li Cain:
Part of it was the owner was new. I think he had taken over that school maybe for about a year, and number two, he's been, and this like anecdotal evidence, I haven't directly heard him say this but he's always mentioned about try to pay as little as possible for the foreign staff as he called us, and so I kind of knew that if I slapped him with this $25,000 bill that he'd probably pretty shocked and would try to find a way out of it.

Bobbi Rebell:
So what happened?

Sarah Li Cain:
I actually added up, I predicted all the cost for the birth and everything like that and I forwarded it to my principal. Then again the principal and I sat down and we basically said, "Okay, what's the best case scenario, what's the worst case, where can we meet in the middle with him." So we kind of came up with different ways to negotiate with him. The best case was he gives all that money back to me in one go. The second the best was if he paid in installments. And the worst case he refused.

Sarah Li Cain:
But I also said, "Hey, listen, I'm a great employee," and I actually calculated how many students that I brought into the school, so it kind of proved to him that like, hey, I'm helping you make money so therefore this little $25,000 expense wasn't that expensive in the grand scheme of things. What happened then was my principal then forwarded all of this information to the owner of the school and he actually agreed and was like, "Okay, I will pay all this back, I'll reimburse you as soon as you provide all the bills."

Bobbi Rebell:
And did they?

Sarah Li Cain:
Yes. So they did try to fight us a little bit. After my son was born my husband was the one to submit all the bills and so. Then they negotiated with him and said, "Well, we can't pay all this all at once. Is there some way we can just pay you back in increments?" So they did I think pay us the money back in about five installments but we did end up getting all the money back.

Bobbi Rebell:
Okay, that's great. But you used this to actually make broader changes.

Sarah Li Cain:
Yeah. The funny thing was I had no idea that my principal was trying to fight for everyone to get free health insurance. Again, the owner of the school had to legally provide this. She actually ended up using the large medical bill to say to the owner, was like, "Hey, listen, what if another one of your employees gets pregnant. That's like a huge cost," and then she actually presented him with different health insurance options in China and how it ended up being cheaper. And so because of what happened with me, the entire staff actually got free health insurance afterwards.

Bobbi Rebell:
Wow. So how did you feel during this time? I mean you're pregnant, you're having to fight for all this stuff. What were your coworkers saying?

Sarah Li Cain:
It was really interesting. My coworkers didn't necessarily directly ask me about the money side of things because I think in their mind they're like, "Oh man, Sarah's really going to have to fight for this money because the owner is such a cheapskate," as they called him. I was really thankful because ... So my husband and I worked together, and so he really advocated for me when I couldn't, like when I was out on maternity leave and when I was just too tired to really say anything. So he would push me like, "No, listen, Sarah, you have to fight this," or he would go in himself and then talk to the principal which I found out later that he did, and say like, "Here, how can we negotiate all of this?" If it wasn't for his support, I probably wouldn't be able to keep pursuing the money.

Bobbi Rebell:
So what is the lesson for our listeners?

Sarah Li Cain:
The lesson is number one, read your contract, and number two, stand your ground. If it says in your contract that you're supposed to get something, then fight for it because it's written down, it's not a verbal contract, it's a written contract, so definitely pursue it, and get as much support as you need in order to pursue it.

Bobbi Rebell:
Looking back is there anything you would've done different yourself?

Sarah Li Cain:
No, not at all.

Bobbi Rebell:
And Sarah, that brings us to your everyday money tip which also kind of has to do with your health and wellness.

Sarah Li Cain:
Yeah. One of the things I really strive to do is that whenever my husband and I are renting a new place, or when we're looking for a new apartment, we always make sure the kind of amenities there are. We're always looking for somewhere with a gym, how easy it is to walk from let's say the supermarket or my son's preschool, if there's a swimming pool, and just anything else where we don't have to spend extra money. For example, an apartment that we just rented is actually a five minute walk to my son's preschool, it's a few minutes walk to a couple of supermarkets, it's actually closer to my husband's work, it's got a gym, it's got a swimming pool, it's got a playground for my son. So we're effectively saving thousands of dollars a year because now that I can walk with my son to preschool, I don't need a second car. I can just walk again to the supermarket when I need to. I'm saving money on membership fees, things like that.

Bobbi Rebell:
Awesome. All right, Sarah, tell us more about what you're up to. I know you have started season two of your podcast.

Sarah Li Cain:
Yeah. So Beyond the Dollar I co-host it with another money coach, Garrett Philbin. We're just having a lot of fun. We discuss a lot of issues that go literally beyond the dollar, just not practical finance tips, but more of the deeper how money really affects your well being. You can also find me in High Fiving Dollars. I talk a lot about my personal life there. If you have any questions, I love answering reader questions there as well.

Bobbi Rebell:
Awesome. Thank you Sarah.

Sarah Li Cain:
Thank you for having me.

Bobbi Rebell:
I love that Sarah and her husband paid it forward fighting for everyone else to have real health insurance even after they had won their own battle. Financial Grownup tip number one, whenever you know you're going to need to be reimbursed, as was the case with Sarah and her husband, document everything and make sure you have backups including electronic backups. I happen to use Evernote and Dropbox for storage, and I use an app called JotNot as a mobile scanner, and from that app I can upload to the Evernote and/or Dropbox accounts.

Bobbi Rebell:
Make sure you follow up on getting reimbursed, and on bills sometimes the way that the healthcare system is set up may not be as well-run as you would necessarily expect. If you want to learn more about the dangers of what can happen if you're not on top of these things, check out my interview with Chris Browning of the Popcorn Finance podcast. Just go to bobbirebell.com/podcast/chrisbrowning.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial Grownup tip number two, let's talk about lifestyle amenities because I know Sarah's a big fan of them. She makes this a priority. There's an upside and there's a downside. If you have amenities built into your rent or your home cost, you don't have to worry that if money gets tight or you just have a lot of expenses coming up or you're feeling uneasy about your financial situation, you're not going to feel pressured to say take a break from the gym. On the other hand, they do add to your overhead in most cases and if you're not going to use certain amenities, you need to factor that in and be honest with yourself.

Bobbi Rebell:
For example, just about all of us can at least make the argument that we can make good use of a gym. We might blow it off in reality, but we can at least make the case. That might be worth paying for when you're looking for a new residence, especially if it's in a community or an apartment building that has a really nice one. But if you don't have young kids, something like a playground does not add value to your life.

Bobbi Rebell:
Those are pretty mainstream amenities, but some buildings can even have quirky amenities that sound so cool like wine cellars, relaxation lounges, climbing walls, hydrotherapy circuits, bowling allies, pet spas, and of course dog training studio, something we all look for. They are designed to wow buyers and renters, but just because something looks super cool when you're checking out the residence, doesn't mean it's something that you're going to actually use. If they deliver value for you, that's great. But some are just gimmicky and can up the prices. By the way, if you want to read about some of the crazy things happening in the amenities business, I'm going to leave a few fun articles about hot new amenities in the show notes for you guys.

Bobbi Rebell:
If you have not already hit that Subscribe button so you don't miss any upcoming episodes, remember, the episodes are short, about 15 minutes, so if you want to listen for longer, there are three new episodes every week so you can easily binge on a bunch if you have a long commute or you're just running errands and you want a little more content.

Bobbi Rebell:
Be in touch. I am on Twitter @bobbirebell, on Instagram @bobbirebell1, and on Facebook @bobbirebell, and of course DM me your feedback on the podcast. Thanks to Sarah Li Cain and her growing family for helping us get one step closer to being financial grownups.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial Grownup with Bobbi Rebell is edited and produced by Steve Stewart and is a BRK Media production.

After an early divorce set Kayla Sloan on an emotional spending binge and into debt, she discovered she could help herself, by working behind the scenes helping a growing market of entrepreneurs- and then becoming one herself.  

In Kayla’s money story you will learn:

-How her marriage, at age 19, had on her financial behavior

-The way Kayla’s desire to spend, contrasted with her husband’s push to save money, and the conflicts that resulted from those differences. 

-Kayla’s emotional spending after the marriage ended after less than a year

-How Kayla managed the cash flow challenges once she was divorced

-The moment she realized she had hit rock bottom, with $10,000 in credit card debt and just $3 in her banking account

-How her total debt moved into six figures by age 21

-The solution she found, that has morphed into a successful entrepreneurial venture

-What virtual assistants do, and how entrepreneurs can tap into that resource

In Kayla’s lesson you will learn:

-How simply filling up her time with an exciting new venture was enough of a distraction to stop the emotional spending

-How Kayla came up with specific ideas for slashing her debt, and what were the most effective techniques

-Why Kayla also prioritized increasing her income, so she would still be able to enjoy responsible spending

In Kayla’s money tip you will learn:

-Why you should not save your fancy stuff (if you have it) for special occasions

-How she made the most of all the fancy wedding presents she did not use during her marriage, including appliances

-How to avoid buying new things, when you already have things in your home that can get the job done, even if they are not what is conventionally expected

-How to tell if you need a virtual assistant, and how to get yourself ready to onboard a VA. 

In My Take you will learn:

-How to learn the value of your time, and decide if you should outsource aspects of your business

-Where to get fancy stuff to use if you did not get it as a gift for a wedding or special occassion like Kayla. 

Episode links:

kaylasloan.com

Twitter @kaylarsloan

Instagram @kaylarsloan

Facebook @krsloan

Kayla's course on How to be a Virtual Assistant and Make $10k a Month

You can buy vintage dinnerware, crystal, silver and other collectables at places like Replacements.com, Chairish.com and even TheRealReal.com

  

After an early divorce set Kayla Sloan on an emotional spending binge and into debt, she discovered she could help herself, by working behind the scenes helping a growing market of entrepreneurs- and then becoming one herself. In this Financial Grownup podcast episode you'll learn how you can tell when you need a virtual assistant. #Entrepreneur #VirtualAssistant #Debt

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Transcription

Announcer:
Support for Financial Grownup with Bobbi Rebell and the following message come from TransferWise, the cheaper way to send money internationally. TransferWise takes a machete to the hefty fees that come with sending money abroad. Test it out for free at transferwise.com/podcast or download the app.

Kayla Sloan:
I went into total rebellion mode. I adopted a pet kitten. I went to the mall during every spare moment I had when I wasn't working or in class, and racked up about $10,000 in credit card debt and had only about $3 in my bank account.

Bobbi Rebell:
You're listening to Financial Grownup with me, certified financial planner Bobbi Rebell, author of How to Be a Financial Grownup. And you know what? Being a grownup is really hard, especially when it comes to money. But it's okay. We're going to get there together. I'm going to bring you one money story from a financial grownup, one lesson, and then my take on how you can make it your own. We got this.

Bobbi Rebell:
What to know more about how those super successful entrepreneurs pull off their busy schedules? Well, there's usually someone called a virtual assistant behind the scenes keeping everything going. Stay tuned to learn more about how our guest tapped into that need to pull herself out of an emotional spending cycle.

Bobbi Rebell:
First, a couple of announcements. We are having a little competition here. It is about the video promos that you see on social media letting everyone know about the episodes. We've gotten amazing feedback about them and people asking how can they get one. So if you want one for your business or just for yourself, share them, retweet them, repost them between now and July 1st. Whoever does it the most, we will declare you the winner and we will make you a promo for your business or just for you.

Bobbi Rebell:
Also, we want to welcome the new listeners here and thank returning listeners. So glad you are joining us. We keep the podcast short, usually around 15 minutes. The idea is that we're all really busy and sometimes we only have little bursts where we can listen to a podcast, maybe we're running a quick errand, so we want to make it easy for you. And then, of course, if you have more time -- if you commute or you're running around town and want to listen to podcasts while you're doing other things throughout the day -- you can binge listen to three, four, five episodes for an hour or so and enjoy it that way. So whatever works for you, we're all about being flexible and fitting into your lifestyle.

Bobbi Rebell:
Now to our fantastic guest. She is tapping into a growing market need, entrepreneurs who need just the right amount of help but without the commitment of hiring someone -- usually in-person, full-time, where they have to get office space for and so on -- because the growing class of often solo entrepreneurs just need a little help sometimes for a project, sometimes a little longer. Kayla Sloan discovered she had a unique talent for tapping into this demand when she found herself with just $3 in her bank account and growing pile of debt, and needed to find a way out. Here is Kayla Sloan. Hey, Kayla Sloan. You're a Financial Grownup. Welcome to the podcast.

Kayla Sloan:
Thanks for having me.

Bobbi Rebell:
I am excited to have you on because you have tapped into a niche that is so cool in this ever-emerging gig economy because you help entrepreneurs.

Kayla Sloan:
Yes, I am a consultant in the virtual assistant space, and not only do I train people who want to become virtual assistants, but I also work with business owners who are in need of a virtual assistant. So I help them identify what they can outsource so they can up-level their businesses and find a great virtual assistant that can help them get there.

Bobbi Rebell:
Genius. All right, so let's talk about your money story. Sadly, it is something so many of us can relate to, and that is going through things like a divorce, broken relationships, and the financial impact that they can have. In your case, you had $3 in the bank. You basically started emotionally shopping, but that was in reaction to what was going on in the marriage. Tell us more.

Kayla Sloan:
So this story really started when I was about 19-years old. I got married very young and went off to college. I was attending school and he was working, so I wasn't really earning very much money at that time. I had a student internship that paid about $10 an hour is all. And so since he was earning the majority of the money, it really felt like I needed to ask permission whenever I wanted to spend money on anything. Since he was a saver and I was a spender, there was always a lot of conflict around money in our relationship. At the time, I really felt as if I couldn't purchase anything without asking permission, which is never a fun feeling, especially if you are a spender. So fast forward a few months and we actually ended up getting divorced.

Bobbi Rebell:
The marriage was less than a year, right?

Kayla Sloan:
Yes, just under a year. And we had no kids or property to split up, thank goodness, because that would have made it much more difficult I'm sure. I've talked to a lot of friends who've been in that situation. Anyway, we split up and luckily I was able to take the assets with me that I had brought into the marriage; it's just my vehicle, household belongings, things like that. And even my retirement account was intact.

Bobbi Rebell:
So this is interesting. So you were actually in okay financial shape when the marriage actually split up.

Kayla Sloan:
Yes. I really didn't end up that bad off. I was kind of struggling to pay the bills with an immediate cashflow because of only working part-time and suddenly having to pay the rent by myself.

Bobbi Rebell:
But then the trouble came with this emotional shopping, which was really ... This is interesting. It was reactive to the fact that he was so controlling with your finances during the marriage, so then you went the other way.

Kayla Sloan:
Yes, I went the absolute other way. I went into total rebellion mode. I adopted a pet kitten. I went to the mall during every spare moment I had when I wasn't working or in class, and racked up about $10,000 in credit card debt and had only about $3 in my bank account.

Bobbi Rebell:
Oh, my goodness. And of course, then comes graduation time and there's even more debt, correct?

Kayla Sloan:
Yes. Graduation brings on more debt for most people. As you and I both know, student loans are a huge problem. I was lucky in only having about $8,000 of student loans when I graduated, making a total of $18,000. But then I turned right around at age 21, right after graduating, and bought a house for $120,000, so I really was feeling that financial pinch after I graduated.

Bobbi Rebell:
So total debt ... I'm trying to do the math here. $140,000?

Kayla Sloan:
Yeah, pretty close. Pretty close.

Bobbi Rebell:
At age 21, with income of about 10 bucks an hour still?

Kayla Sloan:
At that time, I did land a full-time job after graduation, so my take home salary was probably about $25,000 plus benefits.

Bobbi Rebell:
What I like about this story is that you turned things around basically by starting to think like an entrepreneur. So tell us, fill us in on the rest of what happened.

Kayla Sloan:
Yeah. So I started looking for ways to earn extra income and stumbled upon the world of freelance writing and virtual assistant work. And virtual assistants are basically people who work behind the scenes and help entrepreneurs grow and maintain their businesses. And so I started doing this because I love organizing things and helping people create systems, and really working through some of those problems that entrepreneurs typically struggle with. And after doing it on the side for about 12 months, I was earning the same amount from my part-time business as I was making at my full-time job. So I actually quit my job.

Bobbi Rebell:
Love that. And now you are growing that into a full-blown consulting firm, which is amazing and something that so many entrepreneurs really need these days.

Kayla Sloan:
Yes. I am so excited about this. So I started training people who wanted to be virtual assistants, but then I realized there was a need on the other side for connecting entrepreneurs with those virtual assistants. I find that a lot of business owners struggle with finding someone they can trust, someone who's already trained and knows how to step in and get to work, and so that's where I try to fill that void.

Bobbi Rebell:
Let's talk about what the lesson is for our listeners from this story because you basically were able to stop the emotional spending and then turn that into your motivation to start your own business and basically control your income flow. So what is the lesson for our listeners? And especially, how do you stop that emotional shopping?

Kayla Sloan:
Oh my gosh, stopping the emotional shopping can be so, so hard. But for me it was really about finding something else to fill up my free time, which ended up being my business.

Bobbi Rebell:
So it all came together. So for listeners, what can they do? After shopping, shopping, shopping, how do you come up with something? Do you have a technique? Is it just surfing the internet? What was it that got you this idea?

Kayla Sloan:
Yeah. My first ideas did come from surfing the internet. I did some of those classic things like cutting up the credit cards and putting the rest on ice and all of those kinds of things. And they sound crazy, but they work.

Bobbi Rebell:
So you did those things, and then you just decided that you had to up your income?

Kayla Sloan:
You know, you can only be so frugal. There's only so many things you can cut from your budget, especially if you start to feel deprived. And as a spender, I liked to spend money. I liked my lifestyle, so I decided that I also had to find a way to increase my income because I didn't want to cut anything else from my budget.

Bobbi Rebell:
So your money tip has to do actually with kind of a splurge with things that you already have, which actually is very relatable for many people who get divorced and have a lot of wedding presents that maybe are still unopened, not that I would know anything about that kind of thing. But a lot of times, we get fancy stuff for our weddings or graduations or all kinds of special occasions, and then it just sits there because there's never an occasion that's good enough for this stuff.

Kayla Sloan:
Exactly. That's exactly what I found was, I was going through my divorce, I had all these beautiful that I had received for my wedding, and since I was super broke I didn't have any money to spend. So my tip and the way I that I decided to treat myself, rather than spending is that I started using things I already had. So instead of saving my nice dishes that I got for my wedding and using cheap ones every day, I decided I was going to just use the pretty ones. They make me feel happy.

Bobbi Rebell:
And why not? We're all so busy saving for these magical events that are going to happen, and then we don't ever use all this stuff that we have.

Kayla Sloan:
Exactly. And it just sits there and collects dust, and there's no point in that.

Bobbi Rebell:
So what are some other examples of things that you used that people can relate to?

Kayla Sloan:
I said my nice dishes, and then I also used all of those kitchen appliances that never get brought out. And I decided I was going to make some of my favorite meals instead of saving them for a special occasion or saving them when I had guests over and things like that. I'm a big foodie, so those are probably two of the biggest things for me.

Bobbi Rebell:
Let me ask you just quickly, how do people know if they need a virtual assistant? Because I think that's something that confuses people, is where is the tipping point where you're at the point where you need somebody, and are there certain things to look for?

Kayla Sloan:
Yes. So the first sign that you need a virtual assistant is that things start slipping through the cracks. If you find yourself as an entrepreneur or business owner with more things to do than time to do them, then you definitely need to bring someone on. For entrepreneurs, it can be difficult because you don't want to bring someone on and get stuck paying them if you have busy seasons and slow seasons, so a virtual assistant can really help fill that void because you can kind of pay as you go; pay for a certain number of hours per month, and then if you have extra work, you can buy some more. So it's a lot easier than hiring an employee for a set number of hours no matter what.

Bobbi Rebell:
And what are some specific things that people can outsource to a VA?

Kayla Sloan:
A lot of people start with social media because they find that social media is something that takes up a lot of their time and can easily be outsourced to a virtual assistant. I know a lot of other things are blog post research; sometimes they'll bring on someone to do outlines and things like that. And then also a lot of people who have podcasts use virtual assistants, hint hint.

Bobbi Rebell:
For what kinds of things?

Kayla Sloan:
They will help with show note creation, transcription. They can help with, again, social media when it comes to your podcast as well, so a lot of different things.

Bobbi Rebell:
And what do VAs typically run? What's the range that people would expect to pay?

Kayla Sloan:
For a U.S.-based virtual assistant -- which I think is important to make that clarification -- you're probably going to be looking at as little as $15, but probably as much as $40 or more if you have someone who's very experienced.

Bobbi Rebell:
Tell us more about where people can find you and the kind of things that you are doing, and how people can use your services.

Kayla Sloan:
Sure. My main website is at kaylasloan.com, and that is where you can find out more information about how to work with me to get connected with a virtual assistant. Or if you're wanting to be a virtual assistant, we can connect there as well. And I'm also all over social media.

Bobbi Rebell:
And your handles?

Kayla Sloan:
Are all the same: @kayla-r-sloan.

Bobbi Rebell:
Kayla R. Sloan, very important. Well, thank you so much, Kayla Sloan. This has been absolutely wonderful, and congratulations on your growing business.

Kayla Sloan:
Thank you so much. I hope you have a great day.

Bobbi Rebell:
Hey friends, so here's my take. I love what Kayla is doing for entrepreneurs and for the virtual assistants that are so important to their success. Financial Grownup tip number one: consider outsourcing. Whether or not you are an entrepreneur, think about the value of your time. If you're running a business, maybe you're running a household, consider the best use of your time. Outsourcing may be hiring a babysitter if you're a parent trying to grow a business from home, or if you're an entrepreneur trying to do everything. Sometimes you're better off doubling down on your strength, say sales, or anything that directly has to do with your clients, and it may make sense to have a VA do things that are more administrative in nature, like the billing. Weigh the cost. The great thing about a VA is that you can often hire them on a project basis, so you're not locked in the way you would be if you hired a full-time assistant.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial Grownup tip number two: I love Kayla's money tip to use what you have, even if it's super fancy. But here's my tip if you don't have all that fancy stuff but want to have the fancy stuff and maybe don't have the budget or want to spend the money to go and buy it in the store. You see all that fancy wedding gifts like China and crystal, well a lot of people don't really want it, or they inherited it and they want to sell it, they get rid of it, they just don't use it. So you can often get great stuff, fancy stuff, far less than the everyday stuff if you know where to look. Who doesn't like to feel fancy, right?

Bobbi Rebell:
So some sites to check out: Replacements.com -- they sell vintage and current dinnerware, crystal, silver, and other collectables. Also take a look at Chairish, like sitting on a chair, chairish.com. You can find vintage dinnerware at really amazing prices. They sell a ton of other stuff, including chairs, but also other furniture and vintage stuff; really nice stuff. I spotted a vintage Hermes dinner plate set that retailed for $2,000 and it was down to just 950 bucks. The Real Real, which is known for selling designer handbags and clothing, they also -- a lot of people don't realize this -- they also have things like dishes and serving stuff; high-end names like George Jensen, Tiffany, Vernadeau, all at massive discounts. So check those out if you like the higher end stuff instead of going for the everyday stuff that you may see in, whatever, the mall stores. I don't want to name names, but the everyday stores. You guys know what I'm talking about.

Bobbi Rebell:
Thanks to all of you for being part of our growing Financial Grownup community. If you're enjoying the show, consider leaving a rating and even a review on Apple podcasts. I know it seems like it's going to be really difficult, but it only takes a couple of minutes and it is really appreciated, and makes a big difference in helping other people discover the show. And of course, hit that subscribe button to make sure you don't miss any upcoming episodes.

Bobbi Rebell:
Please follow me on Twitter @bobbirebell, on Instagram @bobbirebell1; you can also DM me there. And then don't forget, if you want a custom video like the promos that we do for the show, join the competition. Share the videos when you see them. You can even see them now on the YouTube channel that we have set up, so just search for Financial Grownup with Bobbi Rebell, that channel on YouTube, and you can see the promos there and check them out that way.

Bobbi Rebell:
We have our first listener episode coming up in June. If you want to be on the show and have a great money story to share, email us info@financialgrownup.com. Tell us what money story you would share, and what everyday money tip you would like to share with our audience, and we will be in touch if you are chosen.

Bobbi Rebell:
Thank you to Kayla Sloan for sharing her story. We'll be watching how her business grows along with all the entrepreneurs that she is working with. So thank you, Kayla, for helping us all get one step closer to being Financial Grownup.

Announcer:
Financial Grownup with Bobbi Rebell is edited and produced by Steve Stewart, and is a BRK Media production.

Retire Inspired’s Chris Hogan had a taste for expensive food at the grocery store- and it was was thinning out his bank account. But when he saw the true cost of his weekly habit he quickly hit the brakes and kept the change. 

 

In Chris’ money story you will learn

-How Chris Hogan had money wake up call

-Why his spending was spiraling out of control

-How he curbed his grocery spending bill from $1500 a month to close to nothing

-How routine and habit was hurting his wallet

-The specific strategy Chris and his wife used to get back on track with their spending

-The crazy meals the Hogans had while cleaning out their food stash!

In Chris’ lesson you will learn

-Chris’s strategy to avoid mixing up wants and needs

-The importance of being intentional with how you spend your money

-How to curb spending even when you think you can afford it

-Chris’ saying: interest you pay is a penalty but interest you earn is a reward

-How to get debt out of your life

In Chris’ money tip you will learn

-Why he believes cash is the best tool to control spending

-How electronic payments can confuse you and cause you to spend more than you intend

In my take you will learn:

-While eating out can be a budget killer, eating at home can be expensive as well

-Be deliberate at the grocery store- have a list and don’t buy those impulse items!

-Don’t shop hungry

-Use apps like Grocery IQ and Grocery pal to help stay on track in the store and to plan better

-Avoid routine spends. But on purpose, and with purpose!

EPISODE LINKS

Chris Hogan’s website https://www.chrishogan360.com/

Chris Hogan’s book Retire Inspired

Chris Hogan’s podcast Retire inspired https://www.chrishogan360.com/podcast/

Chris Hogan’s Retirement calculator https://www.chrishogan360.com/riq/

Follow Chris!

Instagram @ChrisHogan360

Twitter @ChrisHogan360

Facebook https://www.facebook.com/chrishogan360/

 

Grocery apps to check out:

Grocery IQ

Grocery Pal

 

Here are some stories about Grocery apps:

8 apps that will save you real Money on Food- from Money

http://time.com/money/5095326/8-apps-that-will-save-you-real-money-on-food/

10 Best apps to save money on groceries 2018 from Frugal for Less

https://www.frugalforless.com/apps-to-save-money-on-groceries/

Best Grocery List apps article from best products;

https://www.bestproducts.com/eats/food/g1505/grocery-shopping-list-apps/

6 best grocery shopping list apps for iphone and ipad 2018 from appsdose

http://www.appsdose.com/2015/04/6-best-grocery-shopping-list-apps-for-iphone-ipad.html

7 Grocery List apps for iPhone and Android for best shopping experience

https://mashtips.com/best-grocery-list-app-iphone-android/

---

Transcription

Chris Hogan:
You would have thought I was getting ready for Y2K. I had food in the cupboards, the freezers. I had food everywhere, but yet I was still every Saturday morning going to the grocery store.

Bobbi Rebell:
You're listening to Financial Grownup with me, certified financial planner Bobbi Rebell, author of How to be a Financial Grownup. You know what? Being a grownup is really hard especially when it comes to money, but it's okay. We're going to get there together. I'm going to bring you one money story from a financial grownup, one lesson, and then my take on how you can make it your own. We got this.

Bobbi Rebell:
Hey, friends. We talk a lot these days in our society about being mindful. I'm working hard about bringing that into my life in a consistent and intentional way, but we also need to talk about mindlessness especially when it comes to our every day spending. I love the story that Retire Inspired author and podcast Chris Hogan is about to share with us because of its brilliant simplicity. We need to hear this stuff and know that even the people we look up to when it comes to money have not always been the role models for money mindfulness. He became aware, and once he saw the numbers, change came. Chris Hogan, you are a financial grownup. Welcome to the podcast.

Chris Hogan:
Thank you. It's a pleasure to be with you.

Bobbi Rebell:
It's an honor to have you. I am such a fan of all that you do for people from Retire Inspired, the book, to your podcast, to all of your good teachings and advice. It is truly a privilege, and we thank you.

Chris Hogan:
Thank you. It's a pleasure to be with you.

Bobbi Rebell:
You have brought with you a money story about spending and the grocery store, which is something that people don't always realize what's going on there. Do tell.

Chris Hogan:
Bobbi, I had an issue. I wasn't being a grownup at this time.

Bobbi Rebell:
Oh no.

Chris Hogan:
This is back before I had kids. I'm now the proud father of three boys, but no kids, double income household. We were just getting started getting serious about where we were financially and what we were doing. I sat down and was looking at bank statements. I wanted to add up, I wanted to know where was my money going? Where was our money heading? I started adding up the different categories, the eating out, but the grocery bill. This was one that was jumping out at me. I thought, this can't be correct. I went another month back, and yeah, $1,200 a month on groceries, a family of two.

Bobbi Rebell:
What were you buying?

Chris Hogan:
Anything and everything, meats, cheeses, anything and everything at any time. Again, we had the money. We weren't hurting anybody. I went back a third month and added it up. It was like $1,500. I was like, "Okay, let's go back to the $1,200," and it was just too much. Then I started realizing something. I was making the grocery store rich, instead of me building my own wealth. That became my financial wake up call, so to speak. Literally, looking at this, we got intentional. We got on a budget, and we set up a dollar amount that we were going to spend on groceries. That was the taking control. I'll never forget, we looked at all the food that I stockpiled. You would have thought I was getting ready for Y2K. I had food in the cupboards, the freezers. I had food everywhere, but yet I was still every Saturday morning going to the grocery store. I realized something. I was shopping out of habit, not out of necessity.

Bobbi Rebell:
It sounds like it was part of your routine. That was your weekend routine.

Chris Hogan:
That's exactly right. It was the routine. Regardless if we needed anything or not, I was going and buying things because I could. Stepping back and really looking at that, we put some parameters in place. We set up a dollar amount that we were going to spend on groceries, but before we did that we ate the food that we had. I'll never forget, that was a grownup moment for us, really starting to take a stand because the $1,200 to $1,500 that was normally being spent in that month, we didn't spend it that month. We actually sent it toward our debt.

Bobbi Rebell:
The entire amount?

Chris Hogan:
The entire amount. We had $100 for groceries. We built the milk, and eggs, and things like that. The other stuff, we ate the things that we had. Now I'm not going to lie to you, Bobbi, we had some interesting meals. It was interesting. Ramen noodles with corn. We did some stuff, but we made a stand at that point financially that we were going to be in charge, and our habits weren't going to take charge of us.

Bobbi Rebell:
I want to ask you something. Earlier you said you could afford it, but then you said you were putting that money towards debt. You could afford it in terms of cash flow, but yet maybe you should not have been spending that, clearly, because you could have put it towards debt, so your perception of afford has changed.

Chris Hogan:
Absolutely, it did, because my math changed. Looking at debt, it was one of those things that at that time we rationalized it, because why? Everybody had credit card debt, everybody had a car payment. As you start to look at it, and you start to run the numbers, you understand interest that you pay is a penalty. Interest that you earn is a reward. When you start to learn real math, as I call it, you start to see debt for what it is. It's a threat, and it's a thief. You want to get it out of your life.

Bobbi Rebell:
What is the lesson from this for our listeners?

Chris Hogan:
I'd say, "Be intentional." It's the lesson of wants versus needs, and we can get confused. We can want something so bad that we feel like we need it, but I want us to be clear. Set spending limits for yourself. Understand what you normally spend, but let's put some dollar amounts on there of hey, here's what we're going to spend on groceries. This is what we're going to spend eating out. Now you start to construct that budget. It puts you in control, and then you don't have to feel regret.

Bobbi Rebell:
Let's move on to your money tip because this is one, I know what you're going to say. It's so brilliantly simple.

Chris Hogan:
Yes.

Bobbi Rebell:
What is your money tip for everyone that they can use right away?

Chris Hogan:
Right away, my money tip is this. Use cash. I know it sounds crazy, but I'm telling you, when you have cash, and you go into the grocery store with that dollar amount, it helps you stay aware, and it helps you stay in control. Now when they say the total amount is $85, and you count out $85 you are feeling the spending of the money as you're counting out those bills as opposed to with a debit card, the swipe, we don't feel the pain there. It's just this swipe. Now there's a chip, and all these things going on. It doesn't become spending until you balance your checking account. Use cash in those areas that you struggle in, whether it's eating out. Get an envelope, write eating out on it. Put a dollar amount in there each and every pay period. When the money is gone, you're done. It's this great reminder, and it keeps us aware of where we stand financially.

Bobbi Rebell:
All right, Chris. Thank you so much. I want to hear more quickly about what is going on with you, and what you are working on at Dave Ramsey Solutions and at Retire Inspired. Do tell.

Chris Hogan:
Yes. We launched Retire Inspired in 2016. I'm working on my second book that we're going to have ready and available for the public in 2019, but I'm traveling all over the country doing smart money events where we walk people through the baby steps. I'm also doing corporate events where I'm talking about money and leadership. They can go check me out at ChrisHogan360.com, look at the events page, and they can find out where I'm at and where I'm going to be.

Bobbi Rebell:
One my favorite things about what you do in your books, and I hope you have this in your next book, is that you really as you travel you get so many unique stories that are relatable, or sometimes hopefully they won't be relatable because some of them can be pretty scary, but I look forward to hearing more of those stories. In terms of social media, always Chris Hogan 360?

Chris Hogan:
Always, everything, on Facebook as well as Twitter, Instagram. @chrishogan360 is where I'm at.

Bobbi Rebell:
Okay, there was a lot there that I could relate to and have definitely been guilty of. This is a case where I am right in it with you guys. Financial Grownup Tip Number 1: We think of eating out in restaurants as a big expense that has to be watched, and it does, but you can also buy quite expensive items at the grocery store, and have some very pricey home cooked meals, or even worse as in the case of the Hogan household, some expensive food just sitting in the pantry and the freezer. You have to watch that bill. It seems so simple, but make a list when you go shopping and stick to it.

Bobbi Rebell:
You've heard this before, but I'm going to remind you. Don't shop hungry. It happens, I do it. I always buy more than I should and fall for the impulse items. I'm working on it, and you should too. There are a ton of apps that can help you to be more organized and save money when you shop for groceries. I'm going to put links to a few articles with suggestions in the show notes, but a couple to check out just here, Grocery IQ and Grocery Pal. You make your list, and the app will sort out and show you discounts including those for other brands of the same item. While it may seem like it's okay if you can afford it to spend that extra money at the grocery store, it's not always as okay as it seems. For example, in the Hogan's case, they realized that they could be using that money to pay down debt. They thought that they could afford it, but maybe not so much. If you don't have debt, wouldn't it be more fun to do something else with the money, or more smarter, to invest the money? Savings is a good thing.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial Grownup Tip Number 2: Ditch the bad money habits that are just there because they're routine. Chris Hogan was shopping at the grocery every Saturday because it was Saturday. He did not need the food. In fact, he probably didn't have room for it at a certain point. This comes back to things like lattes. If you want one because you want one, and you can afford it, that's fine, but if you're just buying one every morning because that's your routine, think about it. Maybe you want to do something else some days.

Bobbi Rebell:
I want to thank all of you for your ratings and reviews on iTunes. It is making a huge difference in helping others discover our new podcast. I also want to thank Forbes for naming Financial Grownup one of the five podcasts that is getting it right. It was amazing to be getting that kind of recognition less than two months after we started this project. Keep spreading the word, friends, and keep in touch. I am on Twitter, @bobbirebell and on Instagram at bobbirebell1, on Facebook. Check me out under Bobbi Rebell and learn more about the show at, you're getting the theme here, bobbirebell.com/financialgrownuppodcast.

Bobbi Rebell:
Chris Hogan is pretty much as grown up as it gets. I loved his episode, and I hope you did too, and that it got us all one step closer to being financial grownups. Financial Grownup is edited and produced by Steve Stewart and is a BRK Media production.

 

Money expert Lynnette Khalfani-Cox admits she was “young and dumb” when she owed money and could not pay it back. Instead of facing her reality- she hoped if she ignored it, it would go away. It did not. 

In Lynnette’s money story you will learn:

-Why she decided to borrow money from family

-The reason she was not able to pay it back despite having a plan

-Why she hid from several creditors- and her creative cover ups

-The devastating consequences of not paying her debt

In Lynnette’s lesson you will learn:

-Strategies to identify in advance when you are buying to impress others at your own expense

-No one who loves you is going to want you to go into debt for them

-You can run but you can’t hide from debt

In Lynnette’s money tip you will learn:

-The 3 questions Lynnette and  her husband ask each other before taking on debt

-How to borrow strategically

In my take you will learn

-The importance of facing up to your debt

-The danger of getting creditors involved

-Strategies to lower your obligations including meeting in person and negotiating lower payments

Episode Links

MoneyCoachUniversity.com

Askthemoneycoach.com

https://themoneycoach.net

Follow Lynnette!!

Instagram @themoneycoach

Facebook The Money Coach

Twitter @themoneycoach

Money expert Lynnette Khalfani-Cox admits she was “young and dumb” when she owed money and could not pay it back. Instead of facing her reality- she hoped if she ignored it, it would go away. It did not. In this Financial Grownup podcast episode you'll learn how to strategically borrow money. #DebtFree #FinanceTips #BorrowMoney

---

Transcription

Lynette K. Cox:
I was mortified that my sister had to literally call me out and call me on the carpet, and just tell me how raggedy I was being, and how irresponsible.

Bobbi Rebell:
You're listening to Financial Grownup with me, Certified Financial Planner Bobbi Rebell, author of How To Be a Financial Grownup. You know what? Being a grownup is really hard, especially when it comes to money. But it's okay. We're going to get there together. I'm going to bring you one money story from a financial grownup, one lesson, and then my take on how you can make it your own. We got this.

Bobbi Rebell:
Hey, friends. Well, the only thing worse than having debt you can't pay back is having debt and just ignoring it. That will only make it worse. Actually, wait. There is one thing that is actually even worse, and that is, of course, owing money to family and trying to duck it. My guest is Lynette Khalfani-Cox, known as the Money Coach. She is also the force behind Money Coach University. Her sister's loan wasn't the only one she was hiding from. Let's just say there's a guy she wants to impress involved, cars get repossessed, and all kinds of chaos ensues. I can't believe she told us this story. This is definitely unbelievable. Here is Lynette Khalfani-Cox.

Bobbi Rebell:
Lynette Khalfani-Cox, welcome to the show. You are a financial grownup.

Lynette K. Cox:
Hey, thank you so much for having me.

Bobbi Rebell:
Well, it's great to have you, especially because I am such a fan of yours. We've met through friends a couple of times at different events, and of course you were a superstar at the last FinCon, which was fantastic.

Lynette K. Cox:
I am so looking forward to FinCon 2018.

Bobbi Rebell:
Orlando.

Lynette K. Cox:
Exactly. What is not to like about Florida?

Bobbi Rebell:
Exactly. I love the money story that you are going to share with us. You did a little bit of hide and seek in college. You weren't always the superstar that you are now, to say the least.

Lynette K. Cox:
Yeah. That's putting it mildly. The story I want to share is about the time that I hid in college, not just from one creditor, but actually from two. One of the creditors, surprisingly enough, was my sister, Cheryl. I have five sisters, and Cheryl's the oldest one.

Bobbi Rebell:
Oh my.

Lynette K. Cox:
Never a good look there, to hide from a family member that you owe. But also from my car lender. Here's kind of what happened with both situations. I was totally young and dumb when I was in college. Honestly, I didn't borrow wisely, but-

Bobbi Rebell:
What did you borrow for? What were these loans for?

Lynette K. Cox:
With my sister, I had my very first internship, a college internship with ... I'll never forget. With WEAR-TV in Pensacola, Florida, and my sister lived right nearby there at the time, and I was in school in Southern California. I went to University of California Irvine for undergrad. I had this internship, but guess what? It didn't pay. They actually said, "Oh, we'll give you a stipend at the end." What happened was, I asked my sister to borrow money in order to go out there to Florida, to get a plane ticket from Southern Cal into Pensacola area. I had all the best of intentions, and I really did plan to pay her back.

Lynette K. Cox:
Well, what happens? I go back to Southern California after the internship, then I don't. I just don't immediately pay her back. Life got in the way. My tuition, and fees, and books, and supplies-

Bobbi Rebell:
Oh, yeah.

Lynette K. Cox:
... everything else. Then she called me. She was like, "Oh, hey." And she left me a voicemail, and I didn't make a speedy beat to call her back, and then the next week she called me again, and then I didn't call her back, and boy, the third time she called me did she let me have it.

Bobbi Rebell:
Ooh.

Lynette K. Cox:
She said, "Lynette, I don't want you to treat me like you would treat a Visa or a MasterCard, a creditor." She said, "You borrowed from family. I'm your sister and I love you, but you have to be financially responsible. Don't duck your obligations, and most importantly, don't duck me." She said, "If you don't have the money, just say, 'I don't have it.' Or, 'Here, let me pay you back a month from now.' Or, 'Let me work out a payment plan for you.' Or let ..." It was such a wake-up call, Bobbi, I'll tell you, because I was so embarrassed. I was mortified, frankly.

Bobbi Rebell:
Then there was also this car loan.

Lynette K. Cox:
Oh, yeah. There was the car loan. I had a 1987 Hyundai Excel. It was my very first car. Don't you know, that car got repossessed.

Bobbi Rebell:
Oh my gosh.

Lynette K. Cox:
I only missed two payments. I don't know why they did that to me.

Bobbi Rebell:
Is that standard, that they repossess so quickly? Is that the norm?

Lynette K. Cox:
Wait, or was it three? I don't know.

Bobbi Rebell:
But still, that seems ... I don't know. Did you talk to them and say, "Can you cut me some slack?" Was there any dialogue, or you just shut them down?

Lynette K. Cox:
Absolutely not. I was such a bonehead. Again, very quickly, here's what I did. I had a boyfriend at the time. Doesn't it always involve a guy?

Bobbi Rebell:
Uh-oh. Uh-oh.

Lynette K. Cox:
Very nice, sweet guy. We were totally into each other. We're walking through the mall one time in Southern California. We go into a leather store. It was around the holidays. He sees this leather coat, this brown leather coat. I see him look at the tag at the end of the sleeve, on the arm of the coat, and he looks at it quickly and goes, "whew," and just flips that tag back around, as if, "Whew, that's too expensive for my taste." He just keeps walking, but what do I do? Young and dumb. I'm like, "Ooh, note to self. I see that he really liked the coat. I'm gonna come back and buy it."

Lynette K. Cox:
Sure enough, I go back to the store. I spend like $500, which I have-

Bobbi Rebell:
What was your car payment? Do you remember?

Lynette K. Cox:
Yes. It was about $225, $250.

Bobbi Rebell:
We're talking about two months' car payments, which would have prevented the car from being repossessed.

Lynette K. Cox:
Exactly.

Bobbi Rebell:
Oh my gosh.

Lynette K. Cox:
I totally, I just blew it. I mean, I did not even attempt to contact Hyundai Motor Credit Corp, and yes, they did come and take that car, rightfully so, of course.

Bobbi Rebell:
Did the boyfriend drive you around everywhere then?

Lynette K. Cox:
You know what? I learned an even bigger lesson, because I had to fess up. One day I walked out of my apartment that I had. You would have thought I was Halle Berry. I was such an actress, okay? I was like, "Where's my car?" He was like, "Oh my god. Did somebody steal your car? Where's your car?"

Bobbi Rebell:
"You're wearing it."

Lynette K. Cox:
Yeah, exactly.

Bobbi Rebell:
Did he have the jacket on? Oh my gosh.

Lynette K. Cox:
Finally, I fessed up. I was like, "No. You know what, honey? Actually I think my car got repossessed." He was like, "What?" He was like, "What do you mean?" I said, "Well, to be honest, I didn't pay my car note." He was like, "What?" He was so shocked. He looked at me. He said, "If you didn't have the money for it, how come you didn't just ask me? I would have given you the money."

Bobbi Rebell:
Oh my gosh.

Lynette K. Cox:
He was a very sweet guy, and I said, "No, no, no." He knew that I was working at the time. I was a dispatcher for AAA at the time, in college. He says, "Well, can I ask, what did you do with your money?" I was like, "You know that brown leather coat that I got you for Christmas?" He was like, "Yeah." I said, "Well, I kind of spent two car payments on that."

Bobbi Rebell:
See, he wouldn't spend his own money on that.

Lynette K. Cox:
Yeah. But he told me something, Bobbi, again, that I never forgot. He said, "Lynette, I would have never want you to put yourself in the hole for me." It was a wake-up call. I mean, nobody who loves you is really gonna want you to just ... You don't have to spend to impress somebody. You don't have to buy someone's love. You don't have to try to dig yourself in the hole, quote-unquote, to make somebody else happy. It just doesn't work that way.

Bobbi Rebell:
What is the lesson for our listeners? What could you have done differently, looking back with all of your wisdom now?

Lynette K. Cox:
Unquestionably, the biggest lesson that I got is that you can run, but you can't hide, and that literally as much as you may try to duck your responsibilities ... Believe me, I tried to hide that Hyundai. Like, I parked on the side, not right in the front of my apartment complex. But as much as you try to shirk or duck your financial responsibilities, in the end, it always catches up with you.

Bobbi Rebell:
For your money tip, I love that you're going to talk about debt, because sometimes you do need to borrow money.

Lynette K. Cox:
What my husband and I do, before we borrow now, we first ask ourselves three questions. Question one is, "Can we afford to pay cash instead of borrowing?" If the answer is "no," or "not comfortably," then we say, "Is this something that's worth borrowing for?" We love to travel, but is it worth just going into debt, putting it on a credit card, and really, the answer is "no" for that. But the third question is, "If you say yes, it is worth borrowing for, what is the lowest cost source that we can tap to borrow and pay off the debt?" When you do that, at least you're borrowing strategically. You're borrowing wisely, giving it some serious thought and consideration before you just sign on the dotted line.

Bobbi Rebell:
All right. Before I let you go, let's talk about MoneyCoachUniversity.com.

Lynette K. Cox:
Well, I'm doing courses, and I'm teaching people everything under the sun about money, about budgeting. I have a course on there, Negotiating for Women. I have a course about paying for college, credit courses, debt courses. It's really teaching people the nuts and bolts about personal finances, in what I hope is an engaging way, and they get lessons. I give them homework assignments, and we kind of make it fun, but it's all video-based. You know, I write a lot. You know I've written 12 books, but everybody doesn't want to read a 200, 250 page book. Watch a video instead, and learn.

Bobbi Rebell:
You are prolific. Oh my gosh. I mean, 12 books, all these video courses. Amazing. Where can people find you?

Lynette K. Cox:
Well, my free financial advice site is AsktheMoneyCoach.com. A ton of videos on there. 1600 plus articles. You mentioned that I've written 12 books. I'm super proud about that. Then the latest is MoneyCoachUniversity.com. We're all on social media. Everything is just @TheMoneyCoach. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, all that good stuff. Instagram too, now.

Bobbi Rebell:
Instagram too. Everything.

Lynette K. Cox:
I'm on the Gram.

Bobbi Rebell:
I know. I don't know how you do it all. Thank you so much for joining us. This has been great. Thank you so much.

Lynette K. Cox:
Thank you, Bobbi.

Bobbi Rebell:
This episode was a tough one. My friends, I truly hope you do not have an experience anything like Lynette. Financial Grownup Tip number one: Do not duck and cover. If you can not pay a debt, find a way to work something out. No creditor wants to get zero paid back. They want to work with you, and you do not want them sending your case to a collection agency. No one wins there, and it will wreck your credit score. There's nothing more not grownup than just hoping if you ignore the debt it will go away. It will not.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial Grownup Tip number two: Make a phone call to the person or business to whom you owe money. Even if you can, make an appointment and go in person. I say that because if you just email, there's no human touch. If they can sense your goodwill and your honesty, and see you as a person, not a bill to be collected, it could make them want to help you more, because you're a person, not a piece of paper. While you should be prepared to tell them what you can pay- in other words, do your math in advance and come prepared- before you actually offer anything, tell them your story and say, "I want to work something out. I value your service, and you do deserve to be paid, but can you help me out a little here? What can you do for me?"

Bobbi Rebell:
Just give it a few minutes. Let them think about it. They may reduce the overall bill. They may propose some kind of payment plan that works for you better than you even would have proposed to them. Even if they don't, move forward. Set up something. Find a way to pay them something. If you are really tight, a small payment, even if they have to increase down the road.

Bobbi Rebell:
Thanks to all of you for supporting Financial Grownup. If you like the show, take a minute to rate and review us, and if you have not already, please hit the subscribe button so you won't miss any episodes. I want to hear from you guys. Get in touch on social media, @BobbiRebell on Twitter, @BobbiRebell1 on Instagram, and don't forget to leave me comments. Go to my website. Please sign up for my newsletter so I can keep you posted on everything going on with the show. No more hide and seek, my friends. I hope you guys enjoyed Lynette's story as much as I did, and that we all got one step closer to being Financial Grownups.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial Grownup with Bobbi Rebell is edited and produced by Steve Stewart, and is a BRK Media production.

 

The Afford Anything podcast’s Paula Pant wanted to travel the world- but on her own financial terms. The Vegas-based real estate entrepreneur gamified her savings strategy to score enough money to live her DIY travel dreams. 

 

In Paula’s money story you will learn:

-How Paula saved money to travel on a $21,000 salary

-Paula’s strategies to travel on a budget- even when it is not budget travel

-Her side hustles that helped boost her incomes

-The behavioral games she would play to incentivize herself for saving money

-Paula’s strategy to avoid having to delay gratification

-Her specific ‘games’ to make saving fun and rewarding

-Her strategy to travel to places where the cost of living is lower to stick to a $1,000 a month budget. 

In Paula’s lesson you will learn

-How to have a more authentic experience when you travel.

-How to balance saving money with your travel interests

In Paula’s money tip you will learn:

-How to “gamify” saving money

-How to avoid feeling deprived when saving money

-the importance maxing out every retirement account

-How to buy individual stocks without a fee

-How to divert money from your bank account into savings automatically

-How to use Acorns to round up savings when you buy things. 

In my take you will learn:

-Specific resources to "gamify" your finances

-Specific resources to improve your travel experience

EPISODE LINKS

Robinhood

Acorns

Digit

SmartyPig

Qapital

The Points Guy

Scott’s Cheap Flights

Hotel Tonight

Paula’s podcast Afford Anything

Paula’s website Afford Anything

Follow Paula!

Twitter @affordanything

Instagram @paulapant

Facebook Afford Anything

The Afford Anything podcast’s Paula Pant wanted to travel the world- but on her own financial terms. The Vegas-based real estate entrepreneur gamified her savings strategy to score enough money to live her DIY travel dreams. In this Financial Grownup podcast episode you'll learn strategies to travel on a budget and how you can balance saving money with your travel interests. #Travel #TravelTips

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Transcription

Paula Pant:
Never delay gratification. I hate the concept of delayed gratification, because if you get into this mindset of, "Oh, my life is going to suck now so that it can be better later," well, later is just going to be disappointing.

Bobbi Rebell:
You're listening to Financial Grownup with me, Certified Financial Planner, Bobbi Rebell, author of How To Be a Financial Grownup. And you know what? Being a grownup is really hard, especially when it comes to money. But it's okay, we're going to get there together. I'm going to bring you one money story from a financial grownup, one lesson, and then my take on how you can make it your own. We got this.

Bobbi Rebell:
Hey friends, let's talk about travel and seeing the world. Authentic travel within a budget, which is not the same as budget travel. One of the top reasons people want to have financial resources is to travel, and that is something a young Paula Pant, the force behind the Afford Anything website and podcast, wanted to do.

Bobbi Rebell:
Rather than do it through her school, she decided to explore the world on her own terms and her own budget. Her plan, make it a game. Here is Paula Pant. Paula Pant, you are a financial grownup. I'm so excited to have you on the podcast.

Paula Pant:
I am excited to be here, and I don't think I've ever been called a grownup before.

Bobbi Rebell:
You are very much a grownup. Oh my gosh, you have a website and a podcast called Afford Anything, which is sort of everyone's financial fantasy, because we all wish we could afford anything. But as you say, not necessarily all at the same time, right?

Paula Pant:
Exactly. You can afford anything, but not everything.

Bobbi Rebell:
That's the best tagline, I love it. All right, so you brought with you a story that has to do with your love of travel, which makes total sense to me, because I love following your Instagram and all of your fantastic photos of you on all of your various adventures, but you didn't always have the money to fund those adventures.

Paula Pant:
That is totally true. Travel has always been a passion of mine. When I was in college, I really wanted to study abroad, but those programs were prohibitively expensive, like 15 to 20 grand for a single semester. I thought about it and I realized, "I don't really want to study, I just want to go abroad."

Paula Pant:
I realized that if I graduated, I worked, I saved up some money, and then I just went off on my own, if I DIY'd it, so to speak, I could do it for like a much cheaper price tag.

Bobbi Rebell:
Without the university as a middleman, basically.

Paula Pant:
Exactly. So that's exactly what I did. I graduated, I started working. Like you, I was a journalist. I became an entry level newspaper reporter at a very small paper.

Bobbi Rebell:
Where?

Paula Pant:
In Boulder, Colorado. The paper was called the Colorado Daily. It was owned by E.W. Scripps, so it was a part of the Scripps family, but it was the smallest paper, I think, in the Scripps family, and we had a circulation of 40,000. My salary, my starting salary, was $21,000 and this was in 2005.

Bobbi Rebell:
Ouch.

Paula Pant:
So adjusted for inflation, that's like still pretty close to 21,000. I think I did the inflation adjustment, and that's $26,000 per year in today's dollars.

Bobbi Rebell:
Yeah, we actually have not had that much inflation is the truth of it.

Paula Pant:
Yeah, exactly. Between 2005 and now-

Bobbi Rebell:
The last few years, we really didn't. Thank you, Fed. That's changing, but anyway.

Paula Pant:
So yeah, so I made a starting salary of 21,000 in 2005, and then in 2008, which was when I quit that job, I was earning 31,000 at the time, so that was the highest amount that I made during that three year period, and yet during those three years, I, because I was so interested in traveling, I was saving money as much as I could. In order to do that, I did a couple of things. Number one, was I had a side hustle, and I saved all of the money that came in from that side hustle.

Bobbi Rebell:
What was the side hustle?

Paula Pant:
Freelance writing. I freelance wrote for both websites and magazines.

Bobbi Rebell:
And they allowed you to do that? That's nice.

Paula Pant:
Oh yeah, yeah. There was no restriction.

Bobbi Rebell:
Nice.

Paula Pant:
My paper had no restriction against me taking on any outside work. I think they probably knew that we all had to.

Bobbi Rebell:
Yeah, I guess they got away with paying you so little because they knew that.

Paula Pant:
Yeah.

Bobbi Rebell:
So anyway, so okay. So you saved a lot from the side hustle, but still. What else did you do?

Paula Pant:
Because so much of finance is behavioral, so much of it is psychological, I would find ways to spend just a little bit less than I otherwise would. For example, I would go to the grocery store and I'd walk around the store, and I'd fill the cart with whatever was on my list, and then at that last moment before going to the checkout aisle, I would take a look at my cart, and I would find two or three things to put back.

Paula Pant:
Orange juice, for example, you know? Because we don't need, quote unquote, "need," orange juice. You can have water and fresh fruit. Or like potato chips, or Oreo cookies, or whatever. I would pick a couple of things, I'd put them back, and then I would figure out how much money I had shaved off my grocery bill by virtue of doing so, and I would literally pull that money out of my wallet and stick it into an envelope that I kept in the glove compartment of my car.

Bobbi Rebell:
Brilliant, I love it.

Paula Pant:
Yeah, so just little things like that forced me to save money, and it kind of turned it into a game a little bit. If you think about a big goal like saving $25,000, that can seem daunting. But if you think about, "All right, I'm at the grocery store. How can I shave 10 bucks off of this trip?" and you do that consistently over time, A, it's fun, because it's a little bit of a game. It's a bit of almost like a detective ... not a detective, sleuth thing, that's not exactly the right analogy, but you know what I mean. It's like-

Bobbi Rebell:
Yeah.

Paula Pant:
Yeah, it's a kind of challenge.

Bobbi Rebell:
How much did you save in those years, if you have kind of an estimate of how much you saved doing those kinds of things, and give us some travel highlights, where you went.

Paula Pant:
In total during those three years, I saved $25,000.

Bobbi Rebell:
On a salary of 31,000 at most.

Paula Pant:
Exactly. And again, I'll emphasize that I was freelancing during the evenings and weekends, and everything that I made from freelancing after taxes went into my travel savings, so that was where the bulk of those savings came from.

Bobbi Rebell:
And where did you travel?

Paula Pant:
I flew at first to Egypt, and I spent six weeks in Egypt. From there to Israel, and then from there I went to Southeast Asia where the dollar exchange rate really worked in my favor. Hanging out in places like Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, places that just have a much lower cost of living, and where the U.S. dollar goes a lot further. That was a big part of how I was able to travel.

Paula Pant:
During that time, I lived on a budget of $1,000 a month, which again, if you're traveling slowly, like if you're not moving around very often, so you're saving money on transit costs, and you're eating local food, you're not going to restaurants, like you're eating street cart food, or things like that, and you're not drinking much alcohol, if any, that's how you can really make your money stretch quite a ways.

Bobbi Rebell:
What is the lesson for our listeners? I mean, obviously we want to be traveling kind of like locals, I guess, is live like locals, don't just stick to the resorts and the resort food, and the hotels and all that stuff, right?

Paula Pant:
Yeah, exactly. Have a more authentic experience. If you're going to go to all of the trouble of going all the way out to Myanmar, then why would you stay at a four star hotel, if instead you could have a very authentic conversation with somebody there who has just a roadside, street side little ... I can't even call it a café, that's too fancy of a word. Just a little tin ... you know, a couple of pieces of corrugated tin under which they have a little stove through which they can cook you some food.

Paula Pant:
It's a much more real experience. It's just much more authentic, and the fact that it saves money is I think, also a bonus. But don't do everything for the sake of saving money, do it because it gives you an authentic experience.

Bobbi Rebell:
Give us a money tip, something that people can put to work right away. Maybe let's stick to the gamification theme, because that's fun. I like playing money games, because you don't even feel bad when you're saving money. It actually makes you feel good, like you're winning.

Paula Pant:
Exactly. A big part of my philosophy is never delay gratification. I hate the concept of delayed gratification, because if you get into this mindset of, "Oh, my life is going to suck now so that it can be better later," well, later is just going to be disappointing.

Paula Pant:
I'm a big fan of when you're saving money, gamify it, have fun with it. When I tell the story of going to a grocery store, and then right before checkout putting the orange juice back, that was not an act of deprivation, that was a fun challenge, like it was a game that allowed me to save. You could think of it as like scoring points on the leaderboard.

Paula Pant:
I continue to do the same thing today. I want to put as much money into investments today as I possibly can. My core investing strategy is of course, max out every retirement account that I'm eligible to contribute to. Those are like my core strategies, and through those, I put money in an index funds. On top of that, I have this app, it's called Robinhood, that allows you to buy individual stocks fee free.

Paula Pant:
Through Robinhood, I will put extra money into individual stock picking. Now, this is not my core investment strategy whatsoever. This is just extra money. It's money I otherwise would have spent on beer and shoes that instead, I kind of think of making it an in-app purchase in a game. I'm playing this game, and if my budget to play this game is $100 a month, that's the cost of like maybe a fun night out.

Paula Pant:
So for me, instead of having that quote unquote, "Fun night out on the town," I put that money into a game that I'm playing on my phone, and I'm buying some individual stocks that I think are kind of fun. Well, that's a way to put more money into investments than I otherwise would. So that's my money tip, is gamify it.

Bobbi Rebell:
Are there other apps that you like to incorporate that are also kind of on the game theme?

Paula Pant:
Sure, yeah. There's an app called Digit, and that's more of an automated system, so you link it up to your bank account, and it will divert really small sums of money, like three bucks here, four bucks there, into a separate account that then accumulates into a pretty substantial amount of savings over time. That's kind of a fun little automated, gamey sort of way to save more, to hide some savings from yourself.

Paula Pant:
There's another one called Acorns that rounds up every purchase that you make, so if you buy something for $7.36, it will round that up to eight bucks, and put the change into a separate account. It's like another way to gamify it a little bit. Any way that you can take care of the margins in a way that's fun, it's a way to make compounding work in your favor.

Bobbi Rebell:
Oh, great. Paula Pant, you are so much fun. Where can people find out more about you, and follow you, and of course, hear more about your podcast Afford Anything?

Paula Pant:
Sure, well as you mentioned, the podcast is called Afford Anything, and you can find it wherever finer podcasts are sold. So yeah, just head to your favorite podcast player, whether it's Apple, or Overcast, or Stitcher, and just search for the Afford Anything podcast. Then you can also find me on the web at affordanything.com.

Bobbi Rebell:
And your social media handles?

Paula Pant:
Oh, on Twitter I am @AffordAnything. On Facebook I am Afford Anything, and on Instagram I've broken the pattern. Instagram I'm @PaulaPant, so that's P-A-U-L-A P-A-N-T.

Bobbi Rebell:
Putting yourself out there, Paula Pant. Thank you so much. You're so wonderful, and thank you for coming on.

Paula Pant:
Oh, thank you for having me.

Bobbi Rebell:
What would you take out of your grocery cart to save a little money? I know I have a bad habit of throwing extra things into the cart that I was not originally planning on buying, except unlike Paula, I usually don't take them out.

Bobbi Rebell:
All right, let's do Financial Grownup tip number one, listen to Paula. Gamification of good money habits works. Money is psychological, and little wins can inspire us to keep going when we get that positive reinforcement. You can go totally retro and just put your spare change in a jar and watch it add up, or you can use apps like Paula mentioned, including Acorns, Digit, and Robinhood.

Bobbi Rebell:
Other names to help you save and feel like you're playing a game and reward good money habits include Qapital, that's with a Q, Qapital. You get rewarded for things like working out. SmartyPig, which helps you set up little piggy banks for different things. By the way, just so you guys know, I have no financial affiliation at this time with any of those names, and I will always let you know if I do.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial Grownup tip number two, be strategic with your travel, and do what's right for you. I am not a big fan of street food the way that Paula is, and I don't want everyone to feel like they have to travel quite that lean, but if you do want to go the higher end route, put the time in to looking into what the right resources are before you put your money in.

Bobbi Rebell:
I love the Points Guy blog, for example. There are great travel deals, and ideas, and even things at the higher end to help you save money. Another website for deals is Scott's Cheap Flights. If you are willing to wait close to your trip, or in some cases, and I've done this, when you're already on your trip, I've had some great experiences with the app Hotel Tonight. I also think there is great value in literally asking friends, and neighbors, and even virtual friends in Facebook groups that have something in common with you, for their recommendations. Happy travels.

Bobbi Rebell:
Thank you for listening to this episode of Financial Grownup. I truly appreciate everyone who has subscribed, rated, reviewed the podcast and all that good stuff, and thank you in advance to any of you who will now take the time to review it on iTunes or Apple Podcasts, as it is now known.

Bobbi Rebell:
I want to hear from you guys. Follow me on social media @BobbiRebell on Twitter, BobbiRebell1 on Instagram. Leave me comments as well. Go to my website, sign up for my newsletter, so I can keep you posted on everything going on with the show. Paula's story has inspired me to start traveling more, so maybe send me some suggestions.

Bobbi Rebell:
Where should I go? Not just for business. If she's inspired you, let me know that as well. Where are you guys traveling? I hope you got some great takeaways from Paula. I certainly did, as you heard, and that we all got one step closer to being financial grownups. Financial Grownup with Bobbi Rebell is edited and produced by Steve Stewart, and is a BRK Media production.

In this episode, millennial financial literacy advocate David Grasso, of Gen FKD and Bold Business shares the story of his Cuban immigrant mother and how at age 9 she found herself in charge of the family finances after an unexpected accidental death in the family. 

 

In David’s story you will learn:

-How David’s heritage as the child of Cuban immigrants shaped his focus on finances

-David’s strategy for not just making money, but keeping more of it

-The strategies David learned from his mother, who took over her family finances at age 9

-How talking about money at the dinner table can instill children with financial values

In David’s lesson you will learn:

-Why getting a raise is not the solution to your financial problems

-David’s savings plan strategies

-How to be a defensive consumer

-The dangers of automatic bill payments

In David’s Money Tip you will learn:

-Why he focuses on the bigger purchases in his life

-How to be a defensive consumer

-How David uses the Trim app

In my take you will learn:

-How to fight for your price.

-The true story of how I paid $25 for a prescription where one quote I got was for $354!

-How to use online coupons for prescriptions

-Why the price you pay through insurance is not always the lowest

-When to pay attention to big expenditures vs when to acknowledge that little things like latte’s do add up and become big things over time

Links from this episode

Gen FKD @genfkd

Bold Global  @boldglobalmedia

BoldTV

Bold Business

Bookstr

David Bach

Trim app

Check out David Grasso’s articles GenFKD here: http://www.genfkd.org/author/david-grasso

Find David’s Bold Media page at http://bold.global/david-grasso

David is also a content creator @purehouselab

You can follow David

Twitter: @grassroots

Instagram: @grassoroots

Facebook: David Grasso-Ortega

In this Financial Grownup podcast episode, millennial financial literacy advocate David Grasso, of Gen FKD and Bold Business shares the story of his Cuban immigrant mother and how at age 9 she found herself in charge of the family finances after an unexpected accidental death in the family. We also discuss why getting a raise is not the solution to your financial problems and the dangers of automatic bill payments. #Money #MoneyTips #MoneyGoals

In this Financial Grownup podcast episode, millennial financial literacy advocate David Grasso, of Gen FKD and Bold Business shares the story of his Cuban immigrant mother and how at age 9 she found herself in charge of the family finances after an unexpected accidental death in the family. We also discuss why getting a raise is not the solution to your financial problems and the dangers of automatic bill payments. #Money #MoneyTips #MoneyGoals

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Transcription

David Grasso:
"Oh, if I only got a raise I would have more money. Oh, if I only made this much more I would be stable." It never works that way.

Bobbi Rebell:
You're listening to financial grown up with me certified financial planner Bobbi Rebell, author of how to be a financial grown up. But you know what? Being a grown up is really hard especially when it comes to money. But it's okay. We're going to get there together. I'm going to bring you one money story from a financial grown up, one lesson and then my take on how you can make it your own. We got this.

Bobbi Rebell:
So I think we've all had that feeling where if we just had that one little raise or that one more client, we would feel less stressed out financially. I know I've of course felt that way, and so has my friend David Grasso. He's a millennial financial literacy advocate. He's also the editor at non-profit GenFKD. And the anchor of Bold Business where I have had the pleasure of co-hosting with him.

Bobbi Rebell:
David is also the child of Cuban immigrants who came here just after the revolution, their experiences really shaped his focus on not just making money but also on keeping it. He grew up first in a little Havana area of Miami. And fun fact, he later moved to the Disney inspired town of celebration, Florida. Here is David Grasso.

Bobbi Rebell:
David Grasso, you are a financial grown up. Welcome to the podcast.

David Grasso:
I hope I'm a financial grown up by now. I'm a spokesperson for a financial literacy non-profit, Bobbi.

Bobbi Rebell:
You are. So tell me what is new with GenFKD and both business, and of course campus fellows for 2018

David Grasso:
You know, we've expanded our reach, GenFKD is a non-profit dedicated to helping millennials succeed in the new economy. We have a presence on over 30 college campuses. And one of our biggest news items right now is that we jut completed our first four credit class at SUNY Purchase, so that's a state university of New York Campus right outside of New York City.

David Grasso:
On my front, we continue to have the Bold Business Show on BoldTV every week, as well as Bookstr business on one of our partner organizations Facebook page, Bookstr where I interview authors who write about entrepreneurship.

Bobbi Rebell:
And they are super interactive. So everyone should try to watch them live on Facebook. You are on Tuesdays at 9:00 AM correct? With Bold Business.

David Grasso:
Yes. And Thursdays 1:00 PM for Bookstr business.

Bobbi Rebell:
And you can always catch them after. But LIVE is always a lot of fun 'cause then you can literally interact directly with the host. And I've even gotten to be a guest host on the show. So definitely check it out and-

David Grasso:
And we'll have to be back soon Bobbi, we're ready to have you back already.

Bobbi Rebell:
Yes, any time. So David, you brought with you a really compelling money story that has to do with your family's immigration to America from Cuba.

David Grasso:
Yeah. You know my family unfortunately after the Cuban revolution was on the wrong side of things. So they made their way to New Jersey right here outside of New York City. They quickly learned that this was the land of opportunity and that they could get ahead really fast. Unfortunately my mother had to grow up very fast because my grandfather died in a factory accident. And one of my mom's most profound memories from her childhood was having to go ask landlord how much the rent was.

Bobbi Rebell:
How old was your mother?

David Grasso:
My mother was about nine years old.

Bobbi Rebell:
She was nine years old when her father passed away and she was taking charge of the family finances?

David Grasso:
Yeah. And if you know anything about my mother, she's a financial wizard. And she's the type that she constantly talks to us about money. And really the most profound lesson that she passed on that came from her father and our ancestors who came to Cuba penniless from Spain and Italy was that making money was never going to be hard. It was hard to hold on to but ... And I can't tell you how often at the dinner table we talk about how we're going to maintain our family's wealth. And how we can save and how we can be defensive consumers to make sure that money isn't coming out of our bank account that shouldn't be going out.

Bobbi Rebell:
So what is your lesson then to our listeners? How can they apply this to their own lives?

David Grasso:
You know, a lot of people focus on making money. "Oh! If I only got a raise I would have more money. Oh! If I only made this much more I would be stable." It never works that way. The lesson I have for the listeners is no matter how much money you make, you can find a way to spend it. What you should really focus on is a savings plan at any level, because as your income goes up, your needs go up as well. So it's very important to put a certain amount aside and further more it's important to watch all moneys coming in and out of your bank account, and making sure that people aren't double charging you, or charging you more than you expected, et cetera. It's important to be a saving consumer as well as a defensive consumer.

Bobbi Rebell:
I like that, defensive. Can you give me an example of how you've been a defensive consumer, David?

David Grasso:
I'll give you an example. You know Time Warner Cable and you know, a lot of these companies, you know, they offer great services, but a lot of times they double dip into your account. Or suddenly your promo ends and then your price goes up two or three times the amount overnight.

David Grasso:
I constantly sit down and watch my credit cards, and watch all those automatic payments. You know, the automatic payments are so convenient, but they can bedevil you financially.

Bobbi Rebell:
Okay David, before I let you go, I want you to share with us a money tip. And I know the different podcast we had David Bock who is well known for talking about the latte factor, which is all about making sure you don't have your money kind of whittle away on the small things. He always keeps reminding me that it's a metaphor, that it's not literal, that people can have their coffee, but it's about the little things. You are not about the little things. You're about the big things when it comes to your money tip.

David Grasso:
Well, I mean I'm holding a latte in my hand right now, so you know, let's focus on the big things. I have an app called Trim. And it really focuses on the big stuff that's coming out of my account. You know, if I had to follow every latte that I spent money on, I would go crazy. So I use an app called Trim. And it shows me major money movements above $250 that come in and out of my account. That way I notice, if my paycheck wasn't deposited. It I didn't pay a bill on time et cetera. If there's too much money. There's never any mystery as to how much money I'm supposed to have in my account.

Bobbi Rebell:
David, thank you so much. That is awesome. I am going to check out Trim right away, and I'm going to definitely keep my eye on the big things in life. Thank you for joining us.

David Grasso:
Absolutely. From one defensive consumer to the other.

Bobbi Rebell:
All right. Here is my take on what David had to say. I was pretty struck by David's passion for being a defensive consumer. Making money is of course meaningless if it all goes flying out the window.

Bobbi Rebell:
So financial grown up tip number one is to fight for your price. Just this week I went to pick up a prescription at CVS. It was replacing a liquid prescription. This was in a tablet form because of manufacturing problems with the liquid form. So this was not my choice. We've been paying $25 a month. CVS rings up the new prescription. Get this guys, $161 and this is not a one time deal, this is monthly.

Bobbi Rebell:
So we called the insurance company, they basically said, "Well, tough luck. It's not on the formula list. So you're stuck. I was really frustrated because number one, it's not my choice. It was literally the same medicine just in a different form. And the doctor had told me the generics were not a good fit. So that wasn't really an option for me. So I was not going to give up.

Bobbi Rebell:
I looked online because I know there are sometimes coupons available for drugs. And I did find one that said up to 84% off. Literally it was 84% off if you qualify. So of course I had to wait on the line again. And I had them ring it up with a coupon this time. And guess what, no, I did not get a huge discount. Nothing. Not only did I not get a discount. They said you have to forego your insurance if you want us to ring it up this way. So I said, "Sure, how much worse could it get?" And you know what it came up as? $354. And by the way this is for 30 tablets, and it's going to be a monthly prescription.

Bobbi Rebell:
I was pretty upset. So I went to the drug company's website. I was thinking maybe I will write a complaint letter, I don't know. But I looked around there, and by the way this was Pfizer to their credit. They have a program where after you get into their system and fill out the proper paperwork and all that stuff you can actually get this medicine for $25 a month.

Bobbi Rebell:
So that is what I did. And after a grand total of almost two hours of waiting in line, calling lots of people, getting codes and so on, lots of back and forth with this pharmacy, another pharmacy, the drug company, the insurance company. It was a mess, bottom line I paid $25 when some people are paying as much as $354 for this same medicine. Fight for your price, please. Take the time and find out, can you get a lower price for something. And especially when it comes to medication these days there are so many changes going on in our healthcare system. Look for everything. And absolutely this was Pfizer, go to their website, see if they have a program for people to get drugs. It does not necessarily ... It's not income based as far as I know this one was not. Look for those opportunities to get the same medicine at a fraction of the price. It's worth it.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial grown up tip number two. David talked about an app called Trim. Now it helps him with the big stuff. But what I would say to my latte sipping friend is that while you do need to focus on the big stuff to really move the needle in your finances, and to reach big goals like retirement and saving for a down payment and all that stuff, you also should watch the pattern of the little stuff. So, if you're going to have the latte that's fine. But think about the fact that if you are having a latte every singe day, then that does become a big thing. So just keep that in mind.

Bobbi Rebell:
Thank you all so much for taking a few minutes to listen to our show. The feedback and support, truly appreciate it. Love hearing from everyone. Take a moment please to rate and review us on Apple podcast. I keep bringing you these inspiring stories. I hope you enjoyed David Brasso's story and that we all got one step closer to being financial grown ups.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial grown up with Bobbi Rebell is edited and produced by Steve Stuart and is a BRK media production.

This episode with Her Money podcast host and Today Show financial editor Jean Chatzky is about getting the most value for your work. 

In Jean’s money story you will learn

• the impact her divorce had on her financial strategy

• how the loss of her dad changed her perspective on money

• the loss of her job and the career change that followed

• how to assess your financial needs, especially your savings goals

• how focusing on her money created emotional and psychological security

• her  post-divorce college savings plan pivot

 

In Jean’s lesson you will learn:

• how to evaluate your financial needs at different life stages

• which professional advisors she has used at key points in her life

• how to know what to charge clients for your professional services or products

• why and how she shares information about pricing

 

In her money tip you will learn:

• the power of automatic savings

• mental accounting and why it works for her

• using different pools of money for different goals

• guilt free spending

 

In my take you will learn:

• my advice on knowing your worth in the market

• why socializing and making friends in person and online is key to growing your business

• Why you must choose clients that value your work

• How to deal with clients that lowball you on price

• How to grow low paying clients into higher paying ones

Links related to this episode

The Today Show

Jean Chatzky

Her Money with Jean Chatzky

Stacy Tisdale

This Financial Grownup episode with Her Money podcast host and Today Show financial editor, Jean Chatzky, is about getting the most value for your work. We also discuss how to assess your savings goals and how to know what to charge clients for your professional services or products. #SavingsPlan #ChargeYourWorth #Author

---

Transcription

Jean Chatzky:
We were talking about how much we charge for speeches and creating content for various people and various companies. In the last year, I've become much more conscious of sharing these kinds of numbers with people in my circle, because this is the way we are all going to get paid more.

Bobbi Rebell:
You're listening to Financial Grownup, with me, certified financial planner, Bobbi Rebell, author of How to be a Financial Grownup. And you know what? Being a grownup is really hard, especially when it comes to money. But it's okay, we're going to get there together. I'm going to bring you one money story from a financial grownup, one lesson, and then my take on how you can make it your own. We've got this.

Bobbi Rebell:
That was NBC today show financial editor Jean Chatzky, host of the Her Money podcast, and author of countless bestselling books, most recently Age Proof. The clip is part of the lesson that she will share with us, in just a few minutes, about getting paid more. But first, we are going to start with her money story, which has to do with a rocky time in Jean's life, and how she found financial security. Here is Jean Chatzky.

Bobbi Rebell:
Jean Chatzky, financial grownup, welcome to the program.

Jean Chatzky:
Thank you Bobbi, so happy to be here.

Bobbi Rebell:
Yes, and happy 2018, and happy almost 100 episodes of Her Money. Congratulations.

Jean Chatzky:
Thank you, and congratulations on the launch of this podcast, I think it's so much fun.

Bobbi Rebell:
Thank you, it's been quite a year. I remember I think my second time ever as a guest was on Her Money, so it holds a very special place in my heart, and it's really just wonderful content that you're bringing to people, so thank you for that.

Jean Chatzky:
Sure.

Bobbi Rebell:
And everyone of course should check out Her Money.

Bobbi Rebell:
But you have brought with you a really important and compelling money story. Do tell.

Jean Chatzky:
I feel like I was thrust into the real world of financial grownups when I got divorced.

Bobbi Rebell:
And how old were you?

Jean Chatzky:
I was about 40. I mean that's when it hit, and it hit at a time when a lot of things hit. I lost my dad, who had been sick for a while. I got fired from Money Magazine, I mean they didn't actually say fired, but that's what happens when you get laid off. I had to take a whole new look at my life, knowing that I was going to be doing it on my own, knowing that I was going to be a freelancer rather than an employee, starting a business, maybe hiring my own employees.

Bobbi Rebell:
Which you have now.

Jean Chatzky:
Which I have now. And all of it caused me to really take a hard look at the inflows and outflows of money, at what I really needed. And most importantly, at what I needed to meet my savings goals, because when I got divorced, I started saving money like crazy, because nothing else made me feel as safe, and I was not feeling particularly safe in the world at that point.

Jean Chatzky:
And so it took the form of doing everything from buying a smaller house than I could really afford, and just shoving more money every single month into savings, to starting new college accounts for my kids, because the plan that my ex-husband and I had about how we were going to pay off the mortgage and then use that money to pay for college had gone out the window, to really taking a closer look at all of the bills every single month, and seeing what was not necessary.

Bobbi Rebell:
And you weren't doing that before?

Jean Chatzky:
I was doing it, but I wasn't doing it in such a diligent and type A way. I was saving up to the guidelines that I give people, but I just wanted to do more. That's what made me feel safe, was not shoes in the closet, it was just money in the bank.

Jean Chatzky:
So my lesson is a little bit different from that story, but no matter what stage you're at in life, we all need help. And I think asking for help, which I did during that period in my life, from financial advisors, from lawyers, from estate planners, from friends who had been through it before me. We've got to ask for help to figure out how to chart the right course at the right time.

Jean Chatzky:
And I thought about this lesson because I had lunch yesterday with Stacey Tisdale, who is another financial expert/journalist/colleague, who you should absolutely have on this show.

Bobbi Rebell:
Absolutely.

Jean Chatzky:
And we were talking about how much we charge for speeches and creating content for various people and various companies. In the last year, I've become much more conscious of sharing these kinds of numbers with people in my circle, because this is the way we are all going to get paid more. And doing this feels to me like we are really helping each other.

Bobbi Rebell:
Give me a money tip, something that you are using yourself, with your family, that is really making a difference, that people can implement right now.

Jean Chatzky:
Going back to what I told you about saving like a crazy person around the time of my divorce, I save automatically for every goal, even the small ones.

Bobbi Rebell:
Do you separate different accounts you mean?

Jean Chatzky:
I separate. I am a huge believer in mental accounting for which Richard Thaler just won a Nobel prize. I find when you have different pools of money for different things, it's easier to reach your goals. I've got a big trip coming up, I've got that money isolated. I'm saving ahead of time, and it means I will not be looking at big credit card bills that I don't have money to pay off, after that trip happens.

Bobbi Rebell:
And it also takes away the guilt of feeling like maybe I shouldn't treat myself to this trip, because the money is there for that.

Jean Chatzky:
Absolutely. And it doesn't matter if it's a trip, or a handbag, or a spa weekend, or college. Just knowing this is the job that this money has been set aside to do is really, really helpful.

Bobbi Rebell:
Great advice, thank you Jean Chatzky.

Jean Chatzky:
Sure.

Bobbi Rebell:
I love that advice about pricing. Information is power when it comes to pricing your services, especially as we seem to move more and more into the gig economy, not to mention side hustles.

Bobbi Rebell:
So I'm going to just expand on Jean's great advice about knowing what you're worth in the market and getting it. Financial grownup tip number one, get social. Think of others in your field not as the competition, but as your teammates, your allies. Spend time with your people. This can be in person, like Jean does, or even online. There are countless groups these days, especially for example on Facebook, where you can ask people specifically what do they charge?

Bobbi Rebell:
They may not say it publicly in the App itself, but a lot of people are willing to DM you with some actual numbers and helpful tips about what you can and should be charging.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial grownup tip number two, do not work with clients that don't value your work, aka don't pay you enough. Good clients want you to stay in business, that can't happen if you are in a race to the bottom with price. If someone does not want to pay the right price to work with you, odds are this is not the last argument you're going to have with them. If they truly have a budget that is still too small, see if you can limit the scope of what you're doing. If you believe they're going to grow into a client that can eventually afford you, make a judgment call. But make it clear that you are working below rate, and that the numbers are unsustainable and need to grow when their business grows.

Bobbi Rebell:
If it really can't work, consider referring them out to someone who does work with people with smaller budgets. They will appreciate it.

Bobbi Rebell:
Thank you all for listening to this episode of Financial Grownup. We are loving all the amazing feedback. Please subscribe, share, rate, review. It matters, and is truly appreciated.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial Grownup with Bobbi Rebell is a BRK media production.

Rebecca Jarvis, ABC News Chief Business, Technology and Economics Correspondent, and Host and Managing editor of the “No Limits with Rebecca Jarvis” podcast learned her financial lessons early.

But the truth about the value of that education really came to light when she learned what was going on with a dear friend.  

You will learn why you want Rebecca, and friends like her, on your team. 

 

Rebecca's money story:

• The  money lessons from her journalist mom that set her on the right path

• How Rebecca has helped her friends who have run into money trouble

• The ways that poor money decisions can hurt your opportunities, including jobs

• How banks sometimes lure young people into borrowing more money than they can afford

 

Rebecca’s lesson: 

• specific tools to figure out wants vs. needs. 

• advice on how to maintain a budget

• her favorite app for managing money

Rebecca’s money tip:

• How to make sure your education pays off

• What kind of classes to take post-college

• To be featured as a women entrepreneur of the week email Rebecca Jarvis nolimitswithrjpodcast@gmail.com

Links to people and things we talked about in this episode

• No Limits with Rebecca Jarvis podcast

• Robin Roberts

• Gabby Bernstein

• Sheila Nevins

• Randi Zuckerberg

• Mint

• CFP Board

• The Federal Reserve

Rebecca Jarvis learned her financial lessons early. The truth about the value of that education really came to light when she learned what was going on with a dear friend. Listen to this Financial Grownup episode to learn Rebecca's advice on how to maintain a budget and her favorite app for managing money. #MoneyManagement #Budget

Transcription

Rebecca Jarvis:
He even had some issues along the way when he was applying to jobs. If they think of you as somebody who's not a credit worthy individual, they can say, "Hmm is this person really responsible."

Bobbie Rabell:
You're listening to Financial Grownup with me, certified financial planner, Bobbie Rabell. Author of How to be a Financial Grownup. You know what, being a grown up is really hard, especially when it comes to money, but it's okay, we're going to get there together. I'm going to bring you one money story from a financial grownup, one lesson, and then my take on how you can make it your own. We got this.

Bobbie Rabell:
Hey friends, welcome to another edition of Financial Grownup. I do want to first take a moment to thank those of you who are already supporting the show through subscribing, and of course through rating and reviewing it. Those early reviews have been so precious to me. They are truly appreciated, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart. If you haven't rated or reviewed the show and you like it, or you just want to give me some feedback, please do so. It means the world to me.

Bobbie Rabell:
All right, this guest is amazing and inspiring. She was spared some of the most damaging early in life mistakes that so many of us make thanks in large part to her mom's early lessons about using credit cards and the dangers of debt. But, here's where it gets really good guys. In addition to learning early on how to be financially responsible herself, what I love about speaking with her and what really comes through in this interview is that she is an empathetic and truly supportive friend. Many of her friends, for whatever reason, didn't have the ideal financial educations or experiences, but she is there for them. She is not judgmental. She is helpful. Rebecca Jarvis is the Chief Business Technology and Economics Correspondent at ABC News. She is also host of one of my personal favorite podcasts, No Limits with Rebecca Jarvis, which you should definitely check out. In the meantime, here is my interview with Rebecca Jarvis.

Bobbie Rabell:
Rebecca Jarvis, you are such a financial grownup and I'm so excited to have you on the program. Welcome.

Rebecca Jarvis:
Thank you so much Bobbie. I'm so excited to chat with you. I love your books. I love you. You set a great example for so many people.

Bobbie Rabell:
Thank you.

Rebecca Jarvis:
So thank you for what you're doing.

Bobbie Rabell:
Well, speaking of great examples, I am such a fan of the No Limits podcast, which is no moving into live events, which is awesome. I mean I could literally spend my entire podcast rattling off all of my favorite episodes. Of course, I love the live show you just did, which featured Robin Roberts, who holds a special place in my heart because she survived a horrible disease that my mother did not survive. Every time I look at Robin I get emotional and happy for her. I love the Sheila Nevins episode, which is dishy. I'm basically telling people to go through your archives. Of course, my friend Randy Zuckerberg, who is amazing. Tell me more about what's going on for 2018 with No Limits.

Rebecca Jarvis:
Thank you. I really appreciate that. We are starting to do more live podcasts. We did this most recent one with Robin Roberts. Also, Gabby Bernstein, which a number of people probably know from the space. She had an awakening, a moment in her life where she hit rock bottom, and she figured out gratitude to come back and be a stronger person. But what we're looking at now is a year ahead where we will be doing some live events. We'll continue to talk to game changing women. That's my mission statement is to talk to women who have broken down walls, who have figured out how to play the game, set the rules, and looking at their paths, the trade offs along the way, the choices that they've made along the way, what success really means to them and how they're figuring out balancing all of it. It's really honest, authentic conversations. My favorite thing Bobbie is when a guest will say, "I've never told this to anyone before." I know we're in the right spot if that's the conversation that we're having.

Rebecca Jarvis:
We'll continue to do that. We also will continue to feature and highlight women from our community who are No Limits entrepreneurs of the week. Every single week we feature a listener who is building an empire of her own, and how she's doing it. She gets featured on her Instagram account, on my Instagram account. She gets featured on the podcast and we share a little bit about her story. Anybody who wants to apply for that can always email me at nolimitswithrjpodcast@gmail.com. Feel free to send me ideas and submissions as well. I do read all of the emails there.

Bobbie Rabell:
Okay, I can't wait to see who is going to be next on No Limits, but I'm also looking forward to your money story. It's a good one, do tell.

Rebecca Jarvis:
Okay. I would say that for me my money story, it started early. My mom is a financial journalist. She's a columnist at Reuters. When I was a kid, she was a columnist at the Minnesota newspaper where I grew up. She sat me down before college. The conversation that we had prior to me leaving for college was all about credit cards. It wasn't your typical going off to college conversation, but she talked me through the idea that when you go to college, and the rules were a little bit different back then, you could be a bank and advertise anywhere on campus for people to sign up for credit cards. She said they're going to be everywhere. They're going to be hounding you. They're going to tell you it's great, it's the best thing in the world. Don't do it. You need-

Bobbie Rabell:
By the way, people should know, no longer allowed, but they were bribing you too probably.

Rebecca Jarvis:
Exactly. Exactly. That's the latest story that just came out that a lot of these banks are now even working with the colleges and giving kickbacks to the colleges. Anyway, my mom sat me down, she had this conversation with me and basically said, "Becky, whatever you do, do not sign up for these credit card offers that sound too good to be true. You don't need to do that. Instead, save your money and think about every penny that you spend is money that's coming out of your savings account. Don't spend money that you don't have." That really made a huge impact on me. I have to say because I now in my life have two credit cards. From that point forward, I was just much more skeptical. I think, I look around at a number of my friends who didn't necessarily have those conversations ... I actually had a really good friend in college who he ran up $10,000 in credit card debt not fully recognizing at the time that he would eventually have to pay that back.

Bobbie Rabell:
Oh no.

Rebecca Jarvis:
And he's a smart guy.

Bobbie Rabell:
And it's not just pay it back. It's pay it back and paying interest.

Rebecca Jarvis:
Exactly, which the interest on credit cards is always going to be the highest interest that you're going to get. It's way higher than the amount of interest that you pay on a mortgage. Way higher than the interest that you'd pay on a student loan. Credit card debt is some of the worst debt that you can take on. Anyway, this friend of mine, his credit score was ruined so he couldn't go out and get a mortgage or a car loan post-college. He also ended up not being able to afford paying off the loans and ultimately his family had to step in and help in. He even had some issues along the way when he was applying to jobs. If they think of you as somebody who's not a credit worthy individual, they can say, "Hmm, is this person really responsible?" He was. He was totally responsible. But anyway, that was a big lesson for me along the way just thinking about debt and my mom sitting me down. I'm so thankful that she did, talking to me about it early on.

Bobbie Rabell:
Besides obviously not getting into credit card debt in college, what is your lesson for our listeners? What is the takeaway?

Rebecca Jarvis:
I think that one of the biggest takeaways is recognizing that no matter how much money you have, or feel that you don't have, budgeting and thinking through your needs versus wants is a really valuable thing. There's research out there that shows that almost every person, whether they have $10 in their pocket or $100,000 in their pocket, is very likely spending more on wants than they're truly aware of. I cover so many stories about people who have gotten out of debt. One of the biggest things that the people who have gotten out of debt have done is they figured out, they've gone through line by line, their spending for the last three months.

Rebecca Jarvis:
They've said where am I spending on my needs versus where am I spending on my wants. One of the greatest things that you can do for yourself is think about what those wants are in the short term, and if you can cut back on those wants, you will make sure that you have the future cushion and money to spend on your needs and to get out of that debt. I think it's a really important thing to budget and to look at needs versus wants.

Bobbie Rabell:
Do you have any specific recommendations for budgeting? Do you budget?

Rebecca Jarvis:
I've done the budget. You literally sit down with your credit card statements and you go through line by line. You can use a ruler to go through line by line. You circle every single time you see something on that credit card statement that is a want verus a need, you circle it. It's a reminder to yourself that those are not the things, especially if you're already in debt, which so many people are. Credit card debt just passed $1 trillion. It's at the highest level, a record level. Going through those credit card statements, circling the wants. You don't have to go out and get an app. You don't have to go out and get some fancy technology to do this. It is really right in front of you right now. Most people have bank accounts and credit cards that are already on the internet, that you can access on the internet.

Rebecca Jarvis:
I really like Mint. I think Mint is a good app where my husband and I have all of our, every single loan, every single piece of money, every single paycheck, feeds into our Mint account so we have a full picture of how much we have, or need to spend towards various areas. I do think that that's a good way, but I don't want people to feel complicated. We don't have to over complicate it. It's as easy as taking a look at that whatever it is, whether it's your checking account, or it's your credit card, and saying where am I spending my money and where am I wasting my money.

Bobbie Rabell:
Right, the numbers tell you the story.

Rebecca Jarvis:
Yes, completely.

Bobbie Rabell:
Before I let you go, I do want you to give us a money tip. Something you or maybe your husband uses. Something that our listeners can put to work right now.

Rebecca Jarvis:
One tip that doesn't relate to debt or any of the things we've already talked about that I really like is if you are spending money, think about how that money can help improve you in some way, education, additional learning, whether it's useful to your community. Those are the areas where that dollar, whatever amount of money that you're putting out there, will come back to you ten X, will come back to you so much, with so much more value than just the single penny or dollar that you've spent. Think about those places, when you are spending, think about those places where it goes beyond that sugar rush of oh I just got this new thing. Think about those areas where if you spend your money on something to make yourself better or stronger, then you will gain so much more from that dollar than if you just spend it on whatever thing is sitting in front of you.

Bobbie Rabell:
Can you give us a personal example?

Rebecca Jarvis:
Well for me, I've spent my money on education. I mean that's probably the biggest thing I've ever spent my personal money on is going to college, taking ... I'm not good. I'm not there yet, but taking Spanish classes. I haven't done this yet this year, but I was looking at different art classes because I really love art and I really would love to be able to create art better. Even things like a gym class, for example, if you feel healthier, and it's something that you feel like you can regularly commit to. I have a group of girlfriends that I work out with now, and I will spend money on those workouts with that group of girls because it has genuinely made my life exponentially better.

Bobbie Rabell:
It's all about experience versus just having more stuff. Thank you so much Rebecca.

Rebecca Jarvis:
Thank you.

Bobbie Rabell:
This was wonderful. Rebecca Jarvis, No Limits. I can't wait to hear all of your episodes for 2018 and beyond. Thank you so much.

Rebecca Jarvis:
Thank you. Have a great day Bobbie.

Bobbie Rabell:
Wow, Rebecca had a lot of great info and advice. Here is my take. I want to pick up on Rebecca's money tip and the importance of investing in yourself through education. I have always done this, and I really encourage everyone to do it as well. Most recently, some of you know this, I became a certified financial planner. It was a huge investment, both in time and money, but I felt strongly that if I was going to be here giving advice I need to know my stuff. Can I be stumped? Well, definitely. You guys will definitely be able to stump me, and I'm still figuring out the new tax law, but after I left Reuters last spring, I did take a break and I got my CFP.

Bobbie Rabell:
Over the years I've also gone back to school when things just didn't make sense, or I wanted to know more. For example, early on at my first job at CNBC I realized I honestly, truly did not understand how the fed worked. It was something that I would go on to write about quite a bit in my career, so I took a class. I kid you not, I literally took a class on how the fed worked, how the federal reserve worked. There is a class on that. It doesn't get nerdier. I even took a class on technical analysis because it was just so strange and I didn't understand it. Still don't get it 100%, but the point is I'm always learning.

Bobbie Rabell:
So how do you make it work, both from a money perspective and a time one? Financial grownup tip number one, get someone else to pay for it. If you work for a large company, odds are they have a program to reimburse tuition. Some may require good grades. All the better. Incentives are good. If they don't have a program, ask your boss if the company can pay for a course. Explain how improving your knowledge will ultimately benefit the company. For example, if you want to learn a language like Spanish or Mandarin, you could help the company break into markets where that language dominates, or maybe open up an office in another country. Find a way to make your case and get them to pay for it. If not, there are nonprofits that support continuing education, as well as government programs. Do some homework, find the money.

Bobbie Rabell:
Financial grownup tip number two, and this one is harder. Find the time. We are all so busy. Finding time for something that seems like an extra may seem like a non-starter. I had this problem when I decided I was going to write my book. I had a very demanding job, and was barely seeing my family as it was. I would get home literally just in time to tuck my son into bed before I ate a quick dinner and crashed for the night exhausted. I mean I couldn't even get to the mail pile. But then, I thought about it. I decided I was going to write this book and I was going to find the time. But where?

Bobbie Rabell:
Well, I found the earliest time I could drop my son off at his school, and even if I had a ton of work and a huge busy day ahead of me, I did not go into the office early. I created a window of time between school drop off and my job, my primary job, and stuck to it as a protected time. No plans with friends. No grabbing coffee with the other moms. No doctors appointments. No phone calls. Just the book. And it worked. Find the a time slot that you can carve out and then protect it like a beast. It works.

Bobbie Rabell:
All right, that wraps up this episode of Financial Grownup. Thank you again for all of your support. If you like the show, or just want to give me some feedback, please rate and review it in iTunes, and of course share it with your friends. I truly appreciate all of your support.

Bobbie Rabell:
Financial Grownup with Bobbie Rebell is a BRK Media production.

Shark Tank’s Kevin O’Leary shares a story about his mother and a secret he learned about after she passed away. The Entrepreneur, who is also behind O’Shares and O’Leary Ventures  reveals in the story how his mothers choices informed his investing style, which is heavily focused on dividends. 

He goes on to discuss the two types of investments his mother chose, including her thinking and mindset in making those choices. 

O'Leary also talks about the importance of the tax changes and why that is something that will benefit investors who follow his strategy. 

In his money tip Kevin explains how people who can’t save can find the money to get on track. He also reveals another lesson from his mother that was a bit surprise. O'Leary also shares his 90 day money test that he does with his wealthy friends to help them stay rich. 

O'Leary talks about an app that he launched  called Beanstox that allows investors to buy small dollar amounts of ETF’s and market-leading stocks. It gets people into investing without having to commit large amounts of capital up-front. 

Links to things mentioned in this episode

• Kevin O’Leary’s financial literacy books the Cold Hard Truth series can be found here. 

• His app to start investing can be found at Beanstox

• To learn more about the companies he backs as well as his wine business and more, go to O’LEARY VENTURES

• Kevin also talked about his ETF business O'Shares

• In his story about his mom he spoke about Chanel and Gucci

Books I recommended in the episode: 

• The Opposite of Spoiled by Ron Lieber

• Smart Money Smart Kids, Raising the next generation to win with money by Dave Ramsey and Rachel Cruz

• Make your Kid a Money Genius even if you are not by Beth Kobliner

• Money A-Z Scott Alan Turner

• Steve Jobs, The man who thought different by Karen Blumenthal

 

I also mention Fincon which is a fantastic conference for anyone who creates content about money. 

Kevin O'Leary explains how people who can’t save can find the money to get on track. O'Leary also shares his 90 day money test that he does with his wealthy friends to help them stay rich and how you can save 10% even when you're living paycheck to paycheck. #SaveMoney #MoneySavingTips

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Transcription

Kevin O'Leary:
The executor called me and said, "Look, your mother has kept a secret account from both of your husbands her whole life, you should come here because you're not going to be executor of this".

Bobbi Rebell:
You're listening to Financial Grown Up, with me, Certified Financial Planner, Bobbi Rebell, author of How To Be A Financial Grown Up, and you know what, being the grown up is really hard, especially when it comes to money. But it's okay, we're gonna get there together. I'm gonna bring you one money story from a financial grown up, one lesson, and then my take on how you can make it your own. We got this.

Bobbi Rebell:
Hey friends, welcome to this edition of Financial Grown Up, and for those of you who have not guessed yet, yes that was the voice of Kevin O'Leary, aka Mr. Wonderful on Shark Tank. He is going to join us in just a moment to share a story about a secret, a financial lesson secret that he learned from his mother only after she passed away. It is a great story and it's gonna change your whole mindset about how you think about investing, so stick with me here. I just want to do a quick introduction to Kevin, tell you guys a little bit more about him for the maybe one or two people out there that don't know exactly who Kevin O'Leary is.

Bobbi Rebell:
He is a serial entrepreneur. He's got his own ventures including an investment company that focuses on dividend ETS. He also is in the wine business and of course, O'Leary Venture supports all the Shark Tank companies that he's invested in. Recent success of note, Plated, which he sold for a cool 300 million dollars. He's also got a really interesting app I want you guys to hear about and you will hear about it in just a moment. Here is Kevin O'Leary.

Bobbi Rebell:
Kevin O'Leary you are a financial grown up and I'm so excited you are on the podcast. Welcome.

Kevin O'Leary:
Great to be here. Thank you so much.

Bobbi Rebell:
And you are, of course, so special in my heart because you are such an advocate for financial literacy. You make it part of everything that you do, including your entrepreneurial ventures. Before we get to the financial grown up moment that you're gonna share with us, I do wanna have you tell us more about the app Beanstox. Tell us about Beanstox.

Kevin O'Leary:
You know, for the last few years I've been teaching at colleges and high schools and I've just been stunned by the fact that we teach young people in America pretty well everything about math and reading, geography, even sex education, but we never talk to them about financial literacy. We never teach them how to invest, and even when I teach graduating cohorts of engineers at places like MIT, Harvard, Notre Dame, Temple, I'm blown away that these young people going off in the workforce have never bought a stock or bonds.

Kevin O'Leary:
So, the genesis of Beanstox, and I've spelt it B-E-A-N-S-T-O-X, is an app. You download it and it allows you to buy fractional shares of your favorite stocks or exchange traded funds, which means if you only have $2 to invest, or $5, or $10 or whatever you've got, you can actually own a real share and learn about how the prices go up and down, when dividends get paid, and just to build a diversified portfolio. I find when you do that on your mobile device, you actually watch it every day. Some people go on 10 times a day, and I've just been thrilled.

Kevin O'Leary:
Hundreds of thousands of them have been downloaded now. People have set up accounts, even if they only put in 50 bucks a month, it's great to start investing because the truth about America is the average salary is $52,000 a year, and if you started investing just 10% of your income at the age of 22, by the time you're 65, if the markets do what they have done for the last 50 years, which is give you six to seven percent a year of return, you'll have 1.2 million dollars sitting in the bank for-

Bobbi Rebell:
Very nice, all right, everybody check out Beanstox now. I'm really excited for you to share your financial grown up moment money story because my mom passed away a few years ago and it's, in some ways, only in retrospect that I learned some really important lessons from her, and you learned a big lesson from your mom at that time.

Kevin O'Leary:
Yes, when she passed away, I was the older son. I'm two years older than my brother, so the executer called me and said, "Look, your mother's kept a secret account from both of her husbands her whole life, you should come here because you're now gonna be the executor of this" and when I got there, I was blown away. I mean she ... I had always wondered how she'd provided for my brother and I, her sisters, and her extended family. She always seemed to have money, and what she had done is she had done exactly that.

Kevin O'Leary:
She had put aside more than 10% of her paycheck when she was a young woman, and she invested in two types of securities. 50% of this portfolio were in large cap dividend paying stocks, and the other half were in Telco bonds, five to seven year bonds and her thinking was that nobody would ever let their phone be disconnected by not paying their bill, so she trusted Telco Company, and this portfolio, over 50 years, outperformed everybody else in the family's, so I did some research.

Kevin O'Leary:
It really changed my mind forever about investing. 70% of the returns of the stock market over the last 50 years have come from dividends, not capital appreciation, so I never buy a stock today that doesn't pay a dividend. I learned that from my mother, and her whole mantra was never spend the principle, only the interest. She was so right about that.

Bobbi Rebell:
And it's interesting because that really did inform your whole approach to investing and your whole business, when it comes to your ETF business.

Kevin O'Leary:
Yes. O'Shares is build around her philosophy. We don't have a single security in any of our O'Shares funds, including the new midcap one OUSM. The reason I'm really intrigued with midcap stocks in America today, the ones that pay dividends, is because of this tax reform. They used to pay 36% tax, now they pay 21, so their cash flows this year are going to grow up by 15 to 20% more free cash. And if you look at the Russell 2,000, which is the universe of all the small companies in America, 339 are profitable and pay tax, and they're all captured in OUSM.

Bobbi Rebell:
Wow, all right so, what is the take away lesson from that story? Do you wish, for example, that you talked to your mom more about her money philosophy and what she was doing?

Kevin O'Leary:
Basically the take away story is this. When you start saving, there's two aspects to your saving. There's the principal, the money you're putting away, and then there's the interest you make off the principal, or the dividends you get if you bought a stock. What she basically said was it's okay to spend and live off the dividends and interest, but it's not okay to spend the principal, because once you spend the principal, you never get it back.

Kevin O'Leary:
The principal is what makes the money for you, so that philosophy is, you live off interest, you live off dividends, and that's how you monetize your lifestyle, but you never dip in to your principal. Some people say, well I really wanna buy a boat, I wanna buy a bigger house, I wanna buy something and I can't because I don't make enough, and they spend their principal. That always ends badly.

Bobbi Rebell:
Wow, all right. Your mom was definitely a financial grown up and certainly we appreciate you sharing what she taught you.

Bobbi Rebell:
Before you go, give us a money tip for our listeners. Something that you do that maybe they can emulate that can make a difference in their financial wellbeing right now. Something they can implement today.

Kevin O'Leary:
I've learned this years and years ago, and again taught to by my mother. When you go out every day, the whole world is designed to take money from you. That's how they market and tell you to buy this or get a new latte or buy new jeans or a new pair of shoes. Every time you get tempted to buy something, and I do this even to this day, I ask myself, do I really need this thing, do I really need it because when I take it, I take my cash and I buy it, I'm basically killing those dollars in terms of them making me interest or dividends because I bought those shoes or I bought those pants or I bought whatever it was.

Kevin O'Leary:
People say to me, well I can't save 10% of my salary. I'm living paycheck to paycheck, and I always remind them what my mother said, yes you can. You buy so much crap that you don't need and anybody can look in their closet and look at all the stuff they don't wear anymore. The shoes they don't wear or the junk they bought, and so I've really, really learned, buy really good things once in a while. And I'll tell you the anecdotal story.

Kevin O'Leary:
When my mother passed away, the women in my family fought like cats or dogs because all her clothes were Channel and Gucci and really good stuff that she kept for decades, but she didn't buy any crap, and that was her lesson to me. Buy a good suit. Buy a great pair of shoes, but don't buy a bunch of junk. That way you feel good about what you own, but you save a lot of money, and I've been able to cut my spending by a ton because I don't buy crap, and because she taught me that.

Kevin O'Leary:
Even wealthy people I work with, I do this special test with them, I say get a piece of paper, just two sheets, you don't need any technology.

Bobbi Rebell:
Oh no.

Kevin O'Leary:
And write down all of the things you make money from in 90 days, and all the money you spend in 90 days, and even really wealthy people outspend their income, and they learned sobering basis. That's my lesson. Do your 90 day test, but don't buy crap. You don't need it.

Bobbi Rebell:
Thank you so much Kevin O'Leary. It was such a pleasure having you. We will all keep tuning in to Shark Tank and all your other ventures, thank you.

Kevin O'Leary:
Take care.

Bobbi Rebell:
I always love talking with Kevin O'Leary, he's an amazing advocate for financial literacy and such an inspiration. Here is my take and it probably won't surprise you guys. Financial grown up tip number one, talk to your parents about money, and yes, get their advice, but also try to get them to open up about what they did right and also, just as important, what they would have done differently. Get them to share their financial grown up moments, their money stories. When we're kids, our parents often shelter us from what is really going on behind the scenes in our daily lives.

Bobbi Rebell:
For example, I remember as a teenager, my family moved into a bigger and newer house. Now, I didn't think that much about it, when I saw my mom putting towels over the windows. It was a little weird, but you know parents can be weird. What I learned later on was that they had really stretched to buy the house, and they were waiting, holding off to buy the window coverings, so my mom was basically making due with what she had, and really, it was just fine, no big deal.

Bobbi Rebell:
All right, financial grown up tip number two, if and when you have kids, make a plan for how you want them to learn about money. There is no right or wrong plan here, every kid has different ways of learning and every family has different things that are right for them. Find out what works for you guys.

Bobbi Rebell:
Some resources though, I am a big fan of a book called The Opposite Of Spoiled by Ron Lieber. Another classic to check out, Smart Money, Smart Kids by Dave Ramsey and Rachel Cruise, and finally, Make Your Kid A Money Genius by Beth Kobliner. Check them out. And, for fun, I was recently gifted a book at FinCon by Scott Allen Turner called Money A To Z. It was a lot of fun to read with my child, and of course, don't shy away from business stories for kids, especially as they get older.

Bobbi Rebell:
Harry is now 10 and we are reading about Steve Jobs. The actual book title if you guys wanna check it out is Steve Jobs The Man Who Thought Different. It is by Karen Blumenthal. It's opening up a lot of discussions about funding a start up and all the different things that go into a business. It's also interesting to read about Steve Jobs and all of his personal quirks, so I will leave it to you guys to see if you wanna read that book with your children or just check it out yourself.

Bobbi Rebell:
Thank you all for listening to Financial Grown Up. We are new and we need your support. Please subscribe to this podcast and then of course, be sure to rate and review it on iTunes and especially please share this with your friends. And until next time, I am wishing all of you financial freedom.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial Grown Up with Bobbi Rebell is a BRK Media production.

Even the best money experts can make money mistakes. For nine-time New York Times best-selling author David Bach, it happened in college.

It is not that surprising that he got buried in credit card debt. That happens to a lot of students who get tempted by the easy credit available. But after paying off his debt, David went back and did it again! 

Things get really interesting when he goes to his parents to ask for help.

In this episode you will hear

David Bach’s Financial Grownup money story including:

• How David Bach got into credit card debt- twice- before even starting his independent adult life

• The tactic the credit card companies used that led to even more debt

• How David’s parents reacted when he came clean about his debt

• The common mistakes college students make when it comes to credit cards

• How that debacle actually led to his beginnings as an entrepreneur as a sophomore in college. 

• What David’s first business was and how it helped him get out of debt

• How Bach learned to automate his savings and investing

• How he has used those early in life lessons to build his own wealth, and teach others as well

David’s Financial Grownup lesson including:

• How damaging credit card can be

• Ways to avoid credit card debt

• Why he has not carried credit card debt since age 21

• How he has avoided borrowing for 3 decades

David’s personal finance tip:

• Why automatic payments are great for investing, but not always for bill paying

• The first thing david cut from his budget in 2018.

• How to decide what to cut from your automatic payments

 

In my take you’ll hear my controversial advice on credit card debt including when to use:

• The avalanche method

• The snowball method

• How and when to use your home equity as a resource

• How and when you should consider opening up a zero interest credit card

 

Links to things mentioned in this episode:

David Bach

Smart Couples Finish Rich

AE Wealth Management

Even the best money experts can make money mistakes. For nine-time New York Times best-selling author David Bach, it happened in college. It is not that surprising that he got buried in credit card debt. Listen to the Financial Grownup podcast on ways to avoid credit card debt. #CreditCardDebt #FinancialGrownup #Money #Author