Jason Wolfe sold several companies for huge profits, including  GiftCards.com for 120 million dollars. The gifting entrepreneur grew up as an orphan at the Milton Hershey School when his mentally ill mother could not care for him. The lessons learned at the school focused on not just a strong work ethic and structure, but also specific lessons on building businesses with a spirit of generosity. 

“As you grow your business.. relationships and networking become so so important to make you successful.”

Jason's money story

I grew up very poor, on welfare. Mother had some mental issues. My dad took off. We thought he was dead. So I grew up in a place I'm not sure how many of your listeners know. There's a person named Milton Hershey, and Milton Hershey was the man who started the Hershey Chocolate Company. He started an orphanage in 1909 and he had it in his heart, him and his wife, to give back to needy children. So in 1915 or somewhere thereabouts, Catherine, his wife passes away. Instead of remarrying, instead of going off and spending a bunch of money, he spent more time with boys in the orphanage and decided to give his fortune to the Milton Hershey School, which is owned by the trust. And in 1945 left $84 million to the trust. Today it's worth $13 billion. I mean I grew up there.

Bobbi Rebell:
So your mother, under these unfortunate circumstances, sent you to live in the orphanage?

Jason Wolfe:
Yes, Yes she did.

Bobbi Rebell:
And what age were you?

Jason Wolfe:
I was 10 years old. And I lived in sort of an agricultural environment with 16 boys. So I lived in a house and we milked cows and baled hay and straw and had that kind of life with two house parents and 16 brothers.

Bobbi Rebell:
Wow. Tell me about the lessons that you learned at the school as a young boy because that became instrumental in all of your success as an entrepreneur.

Jason Wolfe:
Well, I learned hard work obviously. Before going to Milton Hershey School, my mother being, you know, mentally disabled and not being able to take care of us, I was able to stay up until two o'clock in the morning wandering around the streets. It wasn't a hard town I lived in, but it was just one of those things. I didn't have structure or work ethic or anything like that. When I got to Milton Hershey School, I was not able to wander the streets til midnight or two o'clock. I had to get up at five o'clock in the morning, milk cows, get back from school, play sports, all the things that gave me structure in my life and hard work and taught me how to be more responsible.

Jason Wolfe:
What I also learned is I had something that I didn't realize I had until later in life, which is something that people are starting to measure now. It's not IQ and it's not how good looking you are, how good of an athlete you are, it's really that inside grit that you have. If you have grit, fortitude, I learned that that was something that I did have and I learned how to take that grit and form it into what it turned out to be a successful business career.

Bobbi Rebell:
Were they talking to you in the school about how you would support yourself as you grew up? Because that's something universally many parents struggle with. How to teach their children to be earnings-focused and in your case, entrepreneurial-focused. I mean where did that come from in the school environment?

Jason Wolfe:
Yeah.

Bobbi Rebell:
It's incredible.

Jason Wolfe:
Yeah, so they didn't teach us at that time, again, this is in the 1980s, okay. So today the school is different. They have programs to help kids that go through high school to graduate to transition to the real world. Back when I was in that school, they didn't have that kind of thing. So I graduated from that school with a suitcase of clothes and a a hundred dollar check, of which I couldn't cash cause I had no bank account. I learned real quick what a check casher was actually, and I got $67 and 50 cents instead of the $100.

Jason Wolfe:
No I went off and I actually built my own life. I wasn't given tools to figure out how to do it. I did it on my own and I went through some major spinal surgery and was recovering and it was 1995. I taught myself how to write software. I created the first coupon site in 1995, because I bought a book from CompUSA at the time. I'm not even sure how I bought that book to tell you the truth. I didn't have any money. I was living out of my car. I honestly was living out of my car.

Bobbi Rebell:
You were living out of your car?

Jason Wolfe:
Yes.

Bobbi Rebell:
For how long? And how did that happen?

Jason Wolfe:
It happened because I had a couple major surgeries, and I was living with somebody and I couldn't do what I used to be able to do. I was laid up. I was just not the same person. I became depressed after two major spinal surgeries. I just wasn't the same person, so she and I broke up. I had nowhere to go, of course. I grew up in the Hershey School. It's not like I had a family to go to, so I just basically lived in my car, and as I was living in my car, a friend of mine allowed me to use part of his office to put my computer, of which ... that's when I was learning how to build an internet business, and so I went from $4,000 that year in revenue to $35,000 the year after, to 1998 $180,000. '99 a million dollars. I raised a half a million dollars in venture capital in '99, and then I sold it right before the bubble burst in 2000 for $22 million.

Bobbi Rebell:
Wow. What was the tipping point that got you mentally from living in a car to what you just talked about to that progression of incremental progress that then led to where you are today?

Jason Wolfe:
You know, Bobbi, I'm not sure, like I was saying a little earlier, I think some people have what is internally fortitude or grit, and you know it's something that we really haven't measured in our country. You know, when kids are growing up, we don't measure how much grit does this kid have or whatever else. It's something that I had and there was a lot of it, so I was able to pull through things, and then I also have faith in God. And so I believe with my faith and my grit, I was able to pull through some of the things I think a lot of people would not be able to pull through. That's for sure.

Jason’s money lesson

You find a street to go pull your car down that you can sleep in, so nobody will ... you know, the police won't come and get you. You know what I've learned through this is not only about grit and about fortitude, but I also learned the lesson of giving, honestly. I mean, look at Milton Hershey who left his entire fortune to help thousands of children. If it wasn't for Milton Hershey School, not only would I be homeless, I probably would have been in jail or much worse, probably dead. So I look at the lesson to be learned here and probably one of the subconscious reasons why I'm in the gifting business is about giving. It's about giving back and it's about gifting to other people because you can create joy with those people and you can create changes in people's lives. And although I was homeless, and living out of my car, I had a foundation that I learned from Milton Hershey that has proven to be something that was like a cornerstone of my life.

Bobbi Rebell:
So are there specific things that you think you did that made the difference? Clearly mindset, the things that you were talking about, is very important. Are there specific things that you did? It sounds like you had relationships with people that were still strong that you were able to leverage.

Jason Wolfe:
What I learned as I started to grow that business was to find good people that wanted to help with the cause I was doing. I found my first employee. I paid her $50 a month. But she was willing to see in me something that nobody else was seeing. And then I found another person to work for me, and she saw something in me too and she was encouraging me. And so although it wasn't like these grandiose business connections, it was connections with real people that were able to help me pull myself out of that sort of depression and living out of the car and believing in myself. So as I became more successful in business, I started to realize that those networks and those relationships, as you start thinking about them, as you grow your business beyond 50 people or a 100 people or 200 people, that relationships and networking become so, so important to make you successful. Having the right people on the bus in the right seats, but also connecting with people as well.

Bobbi Rebell:
Do you have a way that you find those people?

Jason Wolfe:
Yeah, so in our hiring process, we have a very thorough deep hiring process. We're looking for specific people that are able to join our company with our specific culture that we have. 25 years of success building four companies and selling them profitably. We've been able to do it because the people that joined this company, because we go through a lot of effort to find the right people, but also the networking. I mean, so I'm on the Technology Council board. I try to attend social events. I try to connect with people. I try to connect other people with people and I try to give. And the more that you give, like we give to the tech council, I spend time helping people to grow, back in return comes much to me because of that. And I think as we can think of that, and then the listeners can think about the concept of giving as a financial resource to get back something for yourself. Not that you're doing it intentionally to get something, but it's just the way the universe works.

“When people give it .. makes them feel better, and actually uplifts them more than the person who receives the gift themselves”

Jason's everyday money tip

So I mean, I was looking into this and thinking about giving, and I was thinking about why does it make a difference? And it does. So for every act of giving, you could change the world for good.

I mean it's not like you're changing the world for bad. You're helping helping something. And it's been shown, I guess, and there's some studies, Harvard Business School did a study and found that when people give, it basically makes them feel better and actually uplifts them more than the person that receives the gift themselves.

Bobbi Rebell:
So it's almost ... I hate to say it's almost like the endorphins you get from exercising. I mean, giving to people really will make your life richer, not just theirs.

Jason Wolfe:
Absolutely. And there are studies about it and there's also some studies about ... I was reading about a study in the University of California about how gifting can become contagious, and it inspires observers to feel like they have to be generous, which then it turns them to give more. So it's a contagious thing too. So not only giving makes you happy, it's contagious. And lastly, here's the cooler thing. Here's a real cool thing. Giving actually makes us healthier. So there was a study I was researching also at the University of California Berkeley, found that older people that volunteer, two or more organizations, are 44% less likely to die than their non-volunteers. So it makes us healthier too.

Bobbi’s Financial grownup tips:

Financial Grownup Tip Number One:

Know the commission before any financial transaction and absolutely try to minimize or eliminate it. Jason kind of matter of factly gave the example of getting just $67 back after cashing a $100 check when he was young. I don't know how taking such a big percentage was even legal or the full circumstances behind that, but it is just not right. As an example in my life, my son and I recently went to deposit coins that he had saved. We found out that if you take those coins to one of those coin counting machines that make it, oh so easy, they count it for you, no muss, no fuss, except they take a commission of as much as almost 12% in some cases.


We ended up rolling the coins ourselves and bringing it to our bank's local branch, and we were able to keep all of the money. So it would have been $88. We kept $100 out of every hundred.

Financial Grownup Tip Number Two:

Take a step back and think about Jason's comments about generosity and how he believes that has driven his business goals, his strategy and yes, his success. Let's consider what we can do to support others often at no real cost to ourselves. Jason didn't focus on it, but the fact that his friend supported his early business efforts by offering Jason office space and resources, was a big driver in Jason's ability to start his first business.

Maybe you can make an introduction. Maybe you can offer someone a place to hold a meeting. Maybe you can just give someone your technical equipment when you upgrade. Maybe you can support them by saying something nice on social media. As Jason points out, generosity is a path to success.

Episode Links:

• Blinkist - The app I’m loving right now. Please use our link to support the show and get a free trial.

• Jason’s website - www.JasonWolfe.com

Follow Jason!

• Facebook - @JasonSterlingWolfe

• Twitter - @JasonWolfe

• LinkedIn - @JasonSterlingWolfe

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.

College can be the ultimate adulting experience- including taking on some bad money habits if students aren’t taught the right way to start building a financial life.

4 Things College Students Need To Learn About Money

• Debt can be dangerous (credit cards are not free money, student loans must be repaid)

• Cash flow is king (save money, start budgeting, know needs vs. wants)

• Run your own race (know priorities and allocate dollars accordingly)

• Money is a tool that can help or hurt you in reaching your goals

Episode Links:

• Blinkist - The app I’m loving right now. Please use our link to support the show and get a free trial.

• Tara’s website - www.reisupllc.com

• Tara’s courses MONEY and WEALTH

  • Tara is offering 20% off of either course to our Financial Grownup community. Use the code GROWNUP20 at checkout

Follow Tara!

• Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/reisupllc/

• Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/reisupllc/

• Twitter - https://twitter.com/reisupllc

• YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCe5MrXlrFYJmvRzN9XDAeLA

• LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/tarafalcone/

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.

Bethany Bayless wanted to be a financial grownup when she was an 18-year college student. But when she couldn’t get a traditional college student job near campus, she got creative, earned the money she needed for expenses and found a way to give back to the community. Plus Bethany shares her favorite apps to make extra cash.

“There is a limit to how much you can cut back in your budget. You don’t have to limit your income. ”

Bethany's money story

Bethany Bayless:
When I graduated high school, I went off to college and as a grownup, I just turned 18, and I went to a college that was very small, and it was in a town of six other colleges. We were lots and lots of college students.

Bobbi Rebell:
What town?

Bethany Bayless:
It was Spokane, Washington. In Spokane, there's Gonzaga University, Eastern Washington, all these big universities. There were not a lot of jobs for college students there. It was very very saturated. I was very adamant that I wanted to pay my own rent.

Bobbi Rebell:
You are, by the way, one of five children.

Bethany Bayless:
That's correct. I am the only girl also, I just might add. I didn't want to ask my parents for money because I'm an adult, and that's what adults do is you make your own money. You pay your own rent and utilities, and food, and all of those things. What I did find was that I could go to a plasma bank and donate my blood plasma twice a week. That's exactly what I did. I made $240, and my rent was $240, exactly.

Bobbi Rebell:
Oh my god. Talk a using your god-given resources, Bethany.

Bethany Bayless:
Exactly. I also think, isn't the house rent supposed to be 25% of your income? It was about 100, and so definitely a lesson learned there. I had to do some other little things here and there. This was before side hustle nation. This was before Uber, before Insta Cart, or something else that I could do to earn money. This was the side hustle app of the age, if you will.

Bethany Bayless:
I just learned very very quickly how much money was worth, and even a quarter was the world to me. It was a chunk right there. It was a great experience because I learned to be frugal. I learned to cut back, and I learned to know exactly what I needed. It was a time that I had zero once.

Bobbi Rebell:
By the way, I used to give blood plasma a lot. My mother was sick at a point, and that was something that I was a regular there. One thing that I did learn was that they also feed you there, Bethany.

Bethany Bayless:
Yes. Cool.

Bobbi Rebell:
In addition to the money you could get meals, right?

Bethany Bayless:
Yeah. Basically the way the plasma works for people who are not familiar with this process, we will be talking about blood. Just give that disclaimer very quickly. What they do is they hook you up to a machine. They take out a certain amount.
Bobbi Rebell:
It takes a while.

Bethany Bayless:
Yes.

Bobbi Rebell:
It's a process. This isn't just donating blood. This is a different kind of thing.

Bethany Bayless:
Totally different. Because what they do is they put it in a ... It is a word for it. They put it in a machine where it separates it. They spin it really really fast, and it separates the platelets with the white blood cells, with the red blood cells and your hemoglobin, or whatever. Then they give you back your red blood cells.

Bobbi Rebell:
It takes about an hour sometimes. It depends on your blood pressure, believe it or not. Because I had low blood pressure, and sometimes I would not even qualify because you have to be at a certain level, which makes it a very special thing. People really should donate if you do qualify. It's an important thing to do, I should say. You are there for quite a while.

Bethany Bayless:
It is. I would be there sometimes ... Because you had to go in the waiting room first. Right?

Bobbi Rebell:
Right.

Bethany Bayless:
You have to wait-

Bobbi Rebell:
They set it up for you.

Bethany Bayless:
You have to go through this process. It was a chunk of time, but it was exactly what I needed. I went twice a week. I became friends with Rick, who was the guy who ever single week I would go to him. We became friends. He even had the bedside manner of House, very dry, sarcastic, hated the world, but he called me Sunshine. It was a great experience for me to really do it on my own, to do it myself. I thought, why not. It was the epitome of my desperation pretty much.

Bobbi Rebell:
Also, it is a giving thing to do, and I think it's wonderful that you did that, because even though that wasn't your primary motivation at the time, and I think it's important that people understand that, and that if they are eligible and can do that, it is great to donate plasma.

Bethany Bayless:
Absolutely. Also, I was a universal donor. My blood type is the rarest blood type. I'm AB negative, for anyone who wanted to know. We're finding out so much about each other in this conversation.

Bobbi Rebell:
So much.

Bethany Bayless:
I'm AB negative. It is the universal plasma donor, so anyone could take my plasma.

Bobbi Rebell:
That's wonderful. You didn't mention, what was your favorite snack when you were done? Because they did feed you, so you got food and money.

Bethany Bayless:
Yes, food and money, and I really loved the little cookies. They have little chocolate chip cookies.

Bobbi Rebell:
Yum. Do they have orange juice too?

Bethany Bayless:
Yes, and apple juice, I believe.

Bethany’s money lesson

Bethany Bayless:
The lesson is to do whatever it takes to get by, and to be a financial grownup.

Bobbi Rebell:
Within what is legal and what is reasonable. We need to qualify that, Bethany-

Bethany Bayless:
Absolutely. Do anything that was legal. Should I say that again, Bobbi?

Bobbi Rebell:
Well, I don't know that people should, for example, donate a kidney, that kind of thing. I think that things like plasma, and things like that, are good, but not actual body parts.

Bethany Bayless:
A kidney or another controversial-

Bobbi Rebell:
We want to be clear.

Bethany Bayless:
... another controversial is donating things like eggs.

Bobbi Rebell:
Yes.

Bethany Bayless:
That could have set me up for the entire year, but interesting.

Bobbi Rebell:
It's a personal decision. Just be thoughtful about what body parts and things that you give from yourself.

“I could go to a plasma bank and donate my blood plasma twice a week. So that is exactly what I did. I made $240. And my rent was $240 exactly. ”

Bethany's everyday money tip

Bethany Bayless:
Like I said in my story, there was a time when I gave plasma as my last option, it was a time that these apps did not exist. It was not the age of the side hustle, but now I feel like financial grownups have so many options, because you can cut back. There's a limit to how much you can cut back in your budget. There's a limit to how you can limit your expenses.

Bobbi Rebell:
You can only give plasma twice a week.

Bethany Bayless:
You can only give plasma twice a week, but the other thing is that you don't have to limit your income. That is something that there's no limit to the amount of money that you can make. One of the things that you can do is there are a list of apps, things that we've talked about, like Uber or AirBnb, or things like that. Those are already very well known. Other things like Insta Cart, maybe you want to go grocery shopping for people, and you can do it in your spare time. You can pick up times where you just go grocery shopping. It's a great tool to use. I love getting my groceries delivered. If you want to shop [crosstalk 00:10:29].

Bobbi Rebell:
But you can also be the person delivering the groceries.

Bethany Bayless:
Exactly.

Bobbi Rebell:
We want to be clear. For all of these, you're not the person getting in the Uber. You're the one driving the Uber.

Bethany Bayless:
That's absolutely right.

Bobbi Rebell:
That's where the income comes.

Bethany Bayless:
Exactly. We have Insta Cart. We have Etsy. Maybe it's time to make things online. There's also some other really great ones, like Rover. It's a dog-walking app. If you want to go hang out with dogs for a day, why don't you download Rover, and you're able to go. You can even teach your kids about being responsible, and take them along with you now that you're a financial grownup, if you have children. Those are some of my favorite apps that you can use.

Episode Links:

Bethany’s websites TheMoneyMillhouse.com and BethanyBayless.org

Apps we mentioned in the episode:

• Uber

• Aribnb

• Instacart

• Etsy

• Rover

Follow Bethany!

• Instagram - @BethanyBayless

• Facebook - @BethanyGraceK

• Twitter - @BethanyBayless

• LinkedIn - @BethanyGrace

Follow The Money Millhouse!

• Instagram - @TheMoneyMillhouse

• Facebook - @TheMoneyMillhouse

• Pinterest - @TheMoneyMillhouse
  

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.

Bobbi reveals her favorite new money related books, and how to decide if they are right for you. This month’s picks include The Startup Squad by Brian Weisfeld and Nicole Kear, Grown and Flown: How to support your teen, stay close as a family and raise independent adults which is by Mary Dell Harrington and Lisa Heffernan, And then finally The Essential First-Time Home Buyers book: How to buy a house, Get a Mortgage and Close a Real Estate deal by Judy Dutton and Realtor.com editors.

Some ground rules:

There will be only positive comments. Because why waste your time telling you about something I don’t think is worth your time. 

Also - we limit our selections to books written by authors that appear on the podcast. In most cases they will have already appeared- so you can then go back and listen to their episode if you want to learn more. Occasionally, the episode will be in the future - so hopefully you will subscribe so you don’t miss it. 

Here are 3 books I truly enjoyed in the past month!

Book #1

The Startup Squad - which is aimed at kids but I will tell you it hits on themes and lessons many adults in business will truly benefit from.

Here’s what I liked about it:

1. Don’t be fooled by the illustration on the cover or the fact that this is about a lemonade stand. This is a sophisticated book disguised as a kids book. The book covers a lot of territory.

2. They get into extreme detail- for example: the cost of ingredients, pricing strategy and profit margin, organization and planning ahead, design and branding, the importance of selecting the right location to attract target customers- and of course how to figure out who your target customers are in the first place.

3. The book addresses the more human issues associated with a business- including dealing with imposter syndrome, competition, and interpersonal relationships among team members.

Who is this book for?

This book is of course great for kids but I strongly recommend it for aspiring entrepreneurs. It covers all the bases. I also recommend parents read it and then discuss with their kids. Investors will also benefit because they can learn more about how to identify a business that is setting itself up for success, and the skillset to look for in founders. There are so many layered nuances to this book that it really creates a framework for understanding exactly what goes into a successful startup. I loved this this book and am thrilled it is the first in a series.

Book #2

Moving on the the next life stage- the teenage years. Here we have Grown and Flown: How to support your teen, stay close as a family and raise independent adults which is by Mary Dell Harrington and Lisa Heffernan,who are the founders of the #1 website for parents of teens and young adults. People magazine named them 2 of 25 women changing the world.

Here’s what I liked about it:

1. While there are endless resources for new parents, the information overload thins out substantially as kids get older. But in this age of extended childhood and delayed adulthood, we all need more guidance

2. While the authors have a lot of great advice, the book’s heart and depth comes from it’s broad sourcing of contributors. You feel like you have an army of advisors bringing you information you were either looking for- didn’t know you needed.

3. They go there. Topics include the expected on family life and happiness, college admissions and academics. But they also tackle, love, sex and the ultimate taboo- mental health.. and yes even money. For example: in the chapter on college admissions, the authors point out the importance of understanding the financial costs- the sticker price, meaning the listed tuition, is not the whole story- or even close. Financial aid letters can be misleading And to make sure you understand the average number of years it takes a student to graduate- it is not always four. An example of the advice: Don’t let a small price differential keep you from choosing the school that is the best fit - but that debt also matters a lot and needs to be factored in.

Who is this book for?

Primarily it is for parents of kids ages 15 -25- the teenage and college years. But as the parent of a 12 year old- I can say it’s never too early to learn about these years and if anything it will make you appreciate the simpler times of younger kids.

Book #3

The third book I am recommending this month is The Essential First-Time Home Buyers book: How to buy a house, Get a Mortgage and Close a Real Estate Deal

Here’s what I liked about it:

1. It is to the point. This book is going to get you the information you need, and is a great compliment to the realtor.com website- it is self contained and an easy shortcut for first time homeowners.

2. It has fun and fascinating (and sometimes reality check) trivia. Did you know: the average in state move costs $2300? Moving out of state averages $4300!

3. It cuts through the BS with recurring “myths” like the the fact that a new home doesn’t need to be inspected- or that you can’t buy a home if you have bad credit- even a score under 600. . The editors also tell you the truth that a human often won’t. For example: did you know that your appraiser works for the lender- not you. My favorite: 5 things never to say at a real estate closing.

Who is this book for?

Clearly people who are buying their first home. It’s a small book and you can literally carry it with you when you look at homes rather than fumble to look stuff up on your phone. But also current home owners can benefit- as can renters - because in the end every time we decide to rent or stay in our home- that is a decision made that should be done in comparison to the benefits or drawbacks of owning a home. This book lays out what you need to know- so that you can be deliberate in your decision whether or not to buy a home or upgrade or downsize to a new home

Episode Links:

• Blinkist - The app I’m loving right now. Please use our link to support the show and get a free trial.

• Brian Weisfeld’s Financial Grownup episode + Get your copy of The Startup Squad

• Mary Dell’s Financial Grownup episode + Get your copy of Grown and Flown: How to support your teen, stay close as a family and raise independent adults

• Judy Dutton’s Financial Grownup episode + Get your copy of The Essential First-Time Home Buyers book: How to buy a house, Get a Mortgage and Close a Real Estate Deal

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.

First homes and dorms often trigger huge spending sprees, for what is also usually a very small space. We break down how to prioritize and save money with Mary Dell Harrington, co-author of the new book Grown and Flown, How to Support your Teen, Stay Close as a Family, and Raise Independent Adults.

5 Ways to Save While Setting Up a Dorm of New Apartment

1. Gather all the info before you make one purchase.

2. Never Pay Full Price.

3. Live with your space before buying too much.

4. This Back to School Shopping is Totally Different Than K-12

5. Understand Why Shopping Feels So Important

Episode Links:

• Mary’s website - www.GrownandFlown.com

• Mary’s book Grown & Flown

Follow Mary!

• Instagram - @GrownandFlown

• Facebook - @GrownandFlown

• Facebook - @GrownandFlownParents

• Twitter - @GrownandFlown

• LinkedIn - @Grown-and-Flown

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.

Sarah Larson Levey is becoming a familiar example of millennial entrepreneur success, recently being featured on the cover of Inc magazine and her company Y7 studio being named one of the magazine’s most inspiring companies last year. Keeping her costs at extreme minimal levels helped entrepreneur Sara Larson Levey grow her side hustle yoga startup while still working her full time job for two years.

Sarah's money story:

I actually was really unsatisfied with the yoga experiences that I was having throughout the city. It left me feeling really frustrated and lacking in what I was looking for. I wanted something where I could still move and sweat and get a really great workout in, but at the same time get that mental clarity that is touted for yoga. I just really couldn't find that so I decided to start my own place to practice.

Bobbi Rebell:
Let's take it back a little. You're working in the fashion industry, you're married, you're in Brooklyn, you've got a job, you're busy, you're living your life. Most people, if they're not happy, they're going to fill out a form, a feedback form. You instead start a pop up. How does this happen and where does the money come from? Because you're 20 something, how old are you now?

Sarah L. Levey:
I'm 32 now. I was 26 at the time.

Bobbi Rebell:
Most 26 year olds are dealing with other financial things. How did you literally start this? Where did the money come from? What did you do?

Sarah L. Levey:
The money came from my job. I have always been really good at saving. It was really just supposed to be a pop up at first, right? We found a super, super cheap space. We hired teachers off of Craigslist who are willing to work just to get the teaching experience and that was kind of it. As soon as we realized that this was going to be a thing that there were other people who resonated with the kind of yoga that we are providing, that's when I started looking for a little bit more of a permanent space.

Bobbi Rebell:
One of the things, and I know this as a student, the space is unique. Can you talk a little bit about that and also how do you pay for that? Especially in a pop up because there's a heat element to it. The studios are darkened. It's a very different atmosphere, so there's definitely some investing that has to go on when you set up a space.

Sarah L. Levey:
Yeah, I think for us, we really knew what we wanted and we were lucky enough to find a space that already didn't have windows. We brought in our own heaters and we rented it out by the hour. This space was actually a very large recording studio that was not used during morning hours on the weekends, and that's where we went in.

Bobbi Rebell:
I think that's interesting because a lot of people don't think about that option to rent by the hour when you're starting a business. They might think you have to sign a lease for a longer period of time or come into a space. You were able to manage your cost that way.

Sarah L. Levey:
Absolutely.

Bobbi Rebell:
Then how does it go? You have this pop up, how are you getting the word out and how do you start expanding and funding that expansion?

Sarah L. Levey:
It was all word of mouth. We would go out at like 4, 5:00 AM and just flier all over Williamsburg and Brooklyn where the first location was and that's how people came in. That was really all we did. It was all Instagram, Facebook and flyering around the neighborhood. We didn't have budget for anything. There was no budget to spare. Everything was being funded by my job and my husband's job at the time.

Bobbi Rebell:
How did you get it to the next level? When do you feel you reached a critical point where you started thinking, this is really a thing and I might leave my job to do it? Because a side hustle doesn't always evolve.

Sarah L. Levey:
Right. It took a while. What's so great about New York is it is one of the few places where you can find a space that's willing to do a month to month or maybe do a split tenant kind of thing. We found a small 300 square foot space in an artist loft. All of the little suites were around 300 square feet. We paid a very, very small amount. Everything was included and we started out that way. The studio room could only fit 10 people maximum, and that's how we ran classes. We ran classes four a day before work and after work. I worked the front desk morning and night. My husband and I would switch off. The teachers were paid per student, so it was all dependent on them really getting the word out about their classes and bringing people in. We operated like that for a good nine months before we grew out of that space. Then we were fortunate enough to find another month to month space where we didn't really need to lay all this money out for security.

We were fortunate enough where the business was starting to generate enough cash that we could continue to float the business but that was it which is the reason that I continued working up until the spring of 2015. A good two years after we opened the studio.

Bobbi Rebell:
What kind of conversations were you and your husband having about money while this is going on? What was it like?

Sarah L. Levey:
It was interesting, it was the first time either of us had operated a business on a retail level. We didn't really know what we're doing, but I felt really confident that I didn't want to put classes on the schedule or do things around the studio that would put the vision of the experience in jeopardy. I wanted to always make sure we could pay rent, pay the teachers and also continue not to put pressure on ourselves so we could still do the things we wanted, have both really.

Bobbi Rebell:
Looking back, what is the best thing you did in terms of financial decisions with the business and what's something that maybe you would do differently?

Sarah L. Levey:
That's a tough one because I love our journey so much. I think it's super interesting and an ode to really the fact that you can self-fund a business. We didn't take on private equity funding until we were six studios in and that was a choice on our part. It was definitely a little bit stressful but it was a choice we made so we could really hone the experience and not bring on partners who just had ideas to make more money, have a better cashflow. We were able to preserve the experience of the business. We included mat and towel at first and our laundry expenses were really, really high. I would have started charging for those immediately because we always felt the pinch around that. Other than that, I can't really see doing in another way.

Bobbi Rebell:
How did things change when you did take outside funding?

Sarah L. Levey:
We decided to take on outside funding to really be able to sign nicer spaces. If anyone has ever been to the Flatiron studio or the Union Square studio, those were studios that I painted the walls. I was the one on Craigslist finding people who could throw up a devising wall. We did all the electrical. We commissioned people to build the front desk or things like that. It was super, super bootstrapped. The more people that were coming in and out of the studio, we really wanted to have a little bit nicer amenities because it is hot yoga. We wanted to be able to have showers if we needed to and those things were really, really expensive. Taking on capital for us was a way to really open the doors to higher end retail spaces and have the money to invest in the build-outs.

Sarah’s money lesson:

I would say be realistic. It is totally okay to do two things at once and it's important, that way you don't lose sight of what your actual vision is. I think that if you're stressed about your personal finances, you're always going to be looking for ways to have your business make more money, right? Because you're feeling the pressure personally of like, oh my gosh, how am I going to do this? How am I going to do that? I think that's when people tend to lose the passion for their business because it becomes more of like, it's not growing fast enough, it's not doing what I want to do fast enough. A lot of good concepts take time and they take consistency to work. I would say just be really realistic and don't assume anything when you're planning. Don't assume things are going to work out exactly the way you want. There's always going to be hiccups and you have to be ready to combat that.

Bobbi Rebell:
Is there an example of a hiccup that you can share?

Sarah L. Levey:
Oh yeah, of course. Our first Williamsburg studio was in the basement and there was a spring where we had a ton of snowstorms and then all of it melted and then it rained for like a week straight, the entire studio flooded. It cost us $20,000 which was a huge amount of money to us at the time. We had to replace all the floors, all the electrical. We had to redo basically the entire studio because of a flood. That's something that I never, I don't know, I'd never lived anywhere with a base. I don't know, it just didn't occur. It didn't occur to me and I was like, oh. I was like, I guess we have to close and do all this stuff. Then we had to get a mold check and just all of these things that you don't even think of. That was something that I was like, oh, okay, cool.

Bobbi Rebell:
Oh my gosh. Did you have insurance? Did you have insurance?

Sarah L. Levey:
Not at the time.

Bobbi Rebell:
Okay, but now you do.

Sarah L. Levey:
That is right. Lesson learned.

Sarah's everyday money tip:

Well, I used to all the time, purely out of convenience. I'm a big Postmates girl, I'm Postmating everything and then all of a sudden I was looking at my credit card bill. I was like, what am I spending so much money on? Everything was adding up. Once you do the delivery fee, you add the tip. I'm spending $30 on lunch every single day and it just adds up. Now I make a point where every Monday, I'm very lucky Whole Foods is directly across the street from our office. I stop at Whole Foods every Monday. I'll grab lettuce, vegetables, chicken, whatever it is so I have enough and I bring it to the office and I stick it in the fridge and it's basically like I have enough at the office to make lunch for myself every day. It takes so much pressure off of like making sure I order with enough time before I have to go to a meeting, being really stressed about it. It's here. I can make it when I need it and I'm set for the week.

Bobbi’s Financial Grownup tips

1.Create additional stakeholders in your projects. Sarah empowered her initial round of teachers by paying them per students. The first win is that it saved Sarah on her cost, but the even more important thing it did was it rewarded the teachers for the impact that they made on the business. The more students they could bring, the more they made.

2.Buy insurance if you need it. Sarah blew it at first on this one. The flood sounds like it was a nightmare. Insurance would have cushioned the blow.

Episode Links:

Sarah’s website - www.y7-studio.com

Follow Sarah and Y7!

• Facebook - @Y7Studio

• Twitter - @Y7Studio

• Instagram - @Y7Studio

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.

The top 5 pitfalls for first-time homeowners to avoid

• Pitfall 1: Not checking your credit score

• Pitfall 2: Not figuring out how much home you can afford

• Pitfall 3: Not getting pre-approved for a mortgage

• Pitfall 4: Assuming you need a 20% down payment

• Pitfall 5: Just going with the first real estate agent someone recommends

Episode Links:

• Blinkist - The app I’m loving right now. Please use our link to support the show and get a free trial.

• Realtor.com

• The Book: The Essential First-Time Home Buyer's Book: How to Buy a House, Get a Mortgage, And Close a Real Estate Deal

• Mortgage Calculator

Follow Judy!

• Facebook - @judy.dutton.10

• Twitter - @judy_dutton

• LinkedIn

Follow Realtor.com!

• Facebook - @Realtor.com

• Twitter - @realtordotcom

• LinkedIn - @Realtor-com

• Instagram - RealtorDotCom

• Pinterest - @RealtorDotCom

• YouTube - @RealtorDotCom

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.

Kara Perez of Bravely go and The Fairer Cents podcast shares how she tackled more than $25,000 in student debt making between $9 and $12 an hour. Plus her go-to home recipes for making foods you normally buy in the store including bread, pickles and tomato sauce.

“I had 5 student loans total. Four of them were public. One was private. And zero financial education.”

Kara’s money story:

Kara Perez:
Yes, so let me paint you a picture. I'm 26; I'm living in Austin, Texas. The year is 2014 and I am crying about money every day, because I don't have any and I have a lot of student loan debt and it's ruining my life.

Bobbi Rebell:
Okay, just paint the numbers. What do the numbers look like?

Kara Perez:
Yeah. So, in 2014 I made $18,000. I graduated college in 2011 with $25,302, so flash forward back to 2014, I still have a little over $18,000 in debt. So, my income is equivalent to my debt. I'm making between $800 and $1,100 a month, working as a caterer for $12 an hour and as an MMA gym receptionist for $9 an hour.

So, the money is not really there.

Bobbi Rebell:
Right. And how did you feel?

Kara Perez:
Oh, I felt awful. I just was very much so treading water, if not falling backwards. I had to put one of my student loans ... I had five separate student loans ... I had to put one of them into deferment, because I couldn't make payments on it. I just didn't have enough money. And I was living in Austin, Texas with three roommates. I was trying to be frugal, but it was just ... the numbers quite literally did not add up, and I felt trapped, because I didn't know anything about money.

I didn't know how to use what I had. I didn't know how to get more of it, and I had no idea how to tackle my debt. It just felt like a weight on my shoulders everyday.

Bobbi Rebell:
And I just want to dial back a little bit. How did the debt come about in that, when you were taking it out, did you receive any financial education in the schools? Was it federal loans? Were they private loans? Were you consolidating them? What did this debt look like?

Kara Perez:
Yeah. I had five student loans total. Four of them were public; one was private, and zero financial education. I mean, god bless my mom in many ways, but growing up, we didn't talk about money, except for the fact that we didn't really have to. Single parent household. I have two siblings, and it was just very much so like, no we can't get that. We don't have the money for it. Not, hey, here's what the budget looks like and here's how much we're spending on rent, so we can't spend such and such ... you know, I just didn't have that break down. And in college, I also didn't get that break down.

And so, the narrative I heard was like, well, you'll take out loans so you can afford to go to school, you'll get a job and you'll pay them back. But of course I graduated in 2011, which was the aftermath of the recession and no one cared about my degree in English and jobs were changing and the workplace was changing. That path of take out the loans, get the job, open a 401K, pay back the loans, it wasn't really there anymore.

And so, it was just a whole lot of, "What am I doing?" in my mid-twenties.

Bobbi Rebell:
So, what was the Google search for? What did you search on Google for?

Kara Perez:
Quite literally, how to pay off student loans faster.

Bobbi Rebell:
And what did you find?

Kara Perez:
What was amazing is that a bunch of people who were blogging about personal finance popped up, and now I'm friends with many of those people. I fell into the world of personal finance blogging, where people were sharing their own stories in very casual ways of, "Hey, we're trying to pay off $100,000 in medical school debt," or "We're saving to buy our house in cash." And I thought, okay, this story features a cop and a teacher. If they can do it, I can do it.

For the first time, instead of feeling overwhelmed by money, this insight into other people's stories via their blogs made me feel like, oh, you're a normal person; I'm a normal person. If you can do it, I can do it.

So, from that, I spent two months just voraciously reading personal finance blogs, everything, anything. I was just crushing it. And then I started implementing some of the things I learned in my own life. So, even though I still had a really tiny income, I was able to pay off about $3,000 in 2014 in student loan debt. And so I was making $18,000, paid of $3,000.

Bobbi Rebell:
What specifically did you do? What were the first things that you learned?

Kara Perez:
First thing I learned was to sign up for automatic withdrawals from my checking account to pay my student loans, because I got a .25 percent interest reduction. So, even though it was a teeny amount, and even though I was scared because I didn't always have money in the account, I signed up for it anyway and just committed to always having money in the account. I was like, I'll just find a way. If that means I have to cut back on going out, that's totally fine. If that means I have to pick up an extra shift, I'll pick up an extra shift, but I want to get that reduction so I pay less in interest and I can get out of debt faster.

Bobbi Rebell:
Okay, what other things did you do that you learned?

Kara Perez:
The other biggest thing I would say was just getting organized about which debt I was paying off at a time, because I used to just make an extra $20 payment on this loan and an extra $20 payment on that loan, and my extra payments were kind of just thrown all over the place, and thus they weren't really making an impact.

So, I streamlined it. I used the debt avalanche pay off method, and made all my extra payments on my highest interest debt, and that really started compounding quickly, because an extra $20 every two weeks starts to add up, and then the more money ... I started also focusing on earning more, and in 2015 I made $32,000, which felt like, whoo, so much money!

I was able to put more towards the debt and make an extra $100 payment or something every two weeks, and it really, really started to go down quickly.

“With the right information and the right application you can change your life”

Kara’s money lesson:

The biggest lesson is, with the right information and the right application, you can change your life. So, even if you are really low-income or you're working part-time jobs, or you don't have access to a lot of tools that maybe you see other people having access to, find out what works for you. So, for me, again, it was signing up to get that interest reduction. It was getting very frugal. It was making more money via picking up other side hustles, so that I could funnel all of that toward my debt.

“It often is a healthier choice to make things at home, as well as a time saving and money saving choice”

Kara’s money tip:

Kara Perez:
Yeah, so I am a big ... well, I don't want to say a big, but I am becoming a big at-home cook.

Bobbi Rebell:
We're all evolving.

Kara Perez:
We're all evolving. I'm trying, because I spent so long in the food service industry, I would always take home leftovers. I didn't have any cooking skills. So, this year, I have really focused on making more things from scratch, and I know that sounds a little like, oh, bougie, like, oh you have the time, and you have the energy to do it.

Bobbi Rebell:
Right, and not only that, it's just intimidating also, because a lot of things that you think ... you look around the supermarket and things are made for you. There are things ... it's one thing to say, I'm not going to buy prepared food. I can cut up the cantaloupe myself. Okay, we know you can do that, but a lot of things that we buy, that I assume have to be made in a factory, apparently don't.

Kara Perez:
Definitely not. So, my big thing this year has been making homemade bread, which sounds, again, kind of intimidating, but it's actually so easy.

Bobbi Rebell:
Yeah, because what if you don't have a bread maker. I don't even have room if I wanted to get one for a bread maker.

Kara Perez:
Right. I don't have a bread maker either. You just put your flour, your yeast, your salt and if you want to put something like oats or something in there, you just put it in a bowl, mix it all up with some water, and then you let it rise over night.

The mixing takes two minutes max, you let it rise, and then you pop it in the oven for about 30 minutes, and then boom, beautiful, delicious bread.

Bobbi Rebell:
So, why does everybody feel they have to buy a bread maker? What do the bread makers do?

Kara Perez:
I honestly don't even know.

Bobbi Rebell:
I don't know. I hope the bread maker people don't come after us.

Kara Perez:
The bread maker lobby.

Bobbi Rebell:
Exactly, but there are appliances for every little thing that I don't think that I don't think we really necessarily need, because that's one of my hesitations is, I don't want to do that, I don't want to take out. Like I know I could make mayonnaise myself, but you have to take out the food processor or whatever.

So, there's a couple other things that you're actually going to tell us how to make by ourselves, without having to go to the store, which by the way, also, you're avoiding all the preservatives and all that yucky stuff.

Kara Perez:
Yeah, it often is a healthier choice to make things at home, as well as a time saving and money saving choice. So, I also have started making pickles at home, which is, again, just literally you cut up the cucumbers, you stick them in your jar with some vinegar, some herbs, water, garlic and then you put the top on, and put it in the fridge for 12 hours, and then you've got pickles.

Bobbi Rebell:
Great. I would never think about that. All you have to do take the cucumber and do that, and then it's pickles.

Kara Perez:
Yep.

Bobbi Rebell:
But we always just ... I don't know. It never occurred to me.

Kara Perez:
Yeah, it does work.

Bobbi Rebell:
You got one more.

Kara Perez:
And I make tomato sauce, which we eat a lot of pasta in my house, and so, that, again, it's just kind of stewing the tomatoes, the onions, the garlic, for about 30 minutes and then, boom, tomato sauce.

Bobbi Rebell:
And by the way, I know making pasta is actually not that complicated either. It's basically just making the dough, and you don't need the fancy pasta-maker. You could just cut it into spaghetti or fettuccine or whatever shape you want. There's even just, little rollers that can make different shapes. So, you don't need the fancy pasta machine, that you therefore don't have to buy, and in my case, also, you don't have to have counter space for, because I'm in an apartment. So, I think that's a big thing to remember, that these don't require special equipment.

Kara Perez:
That's such a good ... I didn't even know that. I've been intimidated to make pasta, but now maybe that will be my goal for the next month, make some homemade pasta.

Financial grown-up tip number one:

Be proactive and take ownership of your financial challenges, and don't over-complicate them. For Kara, just having the information by Googling it, and looking up the most simple stuff and then figuring out the tools to create debt re-payment strategies was enough to get her on the path to success.

Financial grown-up tip number two:

Think about the things that we buy from the store that we don't have to buy. We already kind of have them right there, just in a different form. Maybe the labeling is different, but we basically already have them. We don't have to pay up for the fancy brand name.

For example, a lot of cleaning solutions are made up combining products you already have. Sometimes, just adding water. So, for example, and I got this from the Good Housekeeping Institute, which I'll leave a link to in the show notes. You could mix four tablespoons of baking soda with a quarter of warm water and you have a cleaning solution that works on kitchen counters, appliances and the inside of your refrigerator, so you don't need to buy separately another cleaning item, which may even have more chemicals added, who knows what, and you're keeping it simple.

And if you aren't impressed with the money that you are saving doing that, which you should be in general, okay, think of it as keeping your home less cluttered, and your to-do list shorter because you have one less product in your life, and that is, as I said, much less clutter. Just think how proud Marie Condo would be.

Episode Links:

• Blinkist - The app I’m loving right now. Please use our link to support the show and get a free trial.

• Kara’s website - www.BravelyGo.co

• Kara’s course - Talk Money To Me

• The Fairer Cents podcast

• Good housekeeping article - https://www.goodhousekeeping.com/home/cleaning/tips/a24885/make-at-home-cleaners/

• The Four-Hour Week by Timothy Ferriss
  

Follow Kara!

• Instagram - @webravelygo

• Facebook - @webravelygo

• LinkedIn - @BravelyGoLLC

Entrepreneur Dani Nagel has had to defend her pricey Dazey-LA t-shirts but her refusal to cave to pressure to ship manufacturing overseas is winning her fans, and a growing army of ambassadors. She shares her strategies to leverage social media to create transparency, and grow her feminist brand.

Dani's money story:

Dani Nagel:
For sure. I love that article and when it came out, I didn't know what the title was going to be, I just did the interview with them, and I just laughed out loud. Literally the title was Why Thousands of People Are Spending $52 On These T-shirts. And it does seem so backwards because people are used to paying $20 maybe $30 for a shirt, and our shirts are $52, and they're made to order so people are waiting sometimes three weeks to get their shirts. So it seems so backwards in this Amazon age of people getting things in a couple of days at rock bottom prices. But we are all about slow fashion and we make our shirts sustainably out of organic cotton right here in Los Angeles, and they're made to order to eliminate all waste.

“I believe in order to be a truly empowering company, every person that touches our t’s and is a part of this process needs to be positively impacted.”

Bobbi Rebell:
How did you come to the idea that you're going to produce garments this way? Because I'm sure people said to you, "Oh, you should just offshore this and you can retail them for under 10 bucks."

Dani Nagel:
Oh, totally. Every time I look at the prices of producing it in a different place, it's tempting. I'm not going to do it. Like I'm strong standing by my values, but oh my gosh, it's very tempting. You can get things made for a fraction of the price. But another big part of my clothing line is all about female empowerment, and I believe in order to be a truly empowering company, every person that touches our tees and is a part of this process needs to be positively impacted. And the truth is that most clothing companies can't say that. Production overseas is extremely inhumane and the garment workers are being oppressed, they're being in dangerous working conditions, paid extremely low wages, and we couldn't be a company that stood for female empowerment and put empowering phrases on our shirts without also thinking about everyone a part of that process.

Bobbi Rebell:
When you presented these shirts to interested parties, investors, et cetera, what was the reaction? Was there pushback?

Dani Nagel:
You know, where we get the most pushback is when we do Facebook ads, because people just don't understand and they're quick to judge. But luckily with our customers we spend so much time on social media educating them why the shirt costs that much and why it's truly valuable and it should cost that much.

Bobbi Rebell:
And can you tell us more about where is the money going? I don't know if you can literally break down $52 but whatever you feel comfortable disclosing.

Dani Nagel:
Our shirts are actually made to order in Los Angeles, which is really crazy and nobody really does that because it's really difficult. But by doing that, we've been able to eliminate all waste in our production, which is one of the biggest reasons why the fashion industry is the number two polluting industry in the world, there's so much waste. We have partnered with an amazing production company. My production partner, Kelly, has worked with us. We're the Guinea pigs on this big project he had and we met right when I was starting Dazey. And he has a facility in Los Angeles. They small batch make the shirts, so they'll make like 10 shirts in mustard and 10 shirts in off-white. And when the shirts are ordered, that's when they're printed. So it's a really complicated process and it does take time and we really embrace the term slow fashion as literally this is going to be slow. We use that a lot in our marketing.

Dani’s money lesson:

“if you really want to consider being economically inclusive, you have to think about the very bottom of this chain of production which is the person making it and paying them a fair living wage.”

I'm happy to stand up for our shirts every time we get one of those comments, like trolls on Instagram. And since our clothing is so much about female empowerment, some people see the price of our shirts and say something like, "Okay, your shirts aren't economically inclusive." Our brand is all about inclusivity, empowerment and people will say that. And my response to them is, "If you really want to consider being economically inclusive, you have to think about the very bottom of this chain of production, which is the person making it, and paying them a fair living wage is truly what is going to be as economically inclusive as possible." And the truth is when you're paying $20, I mean maybe not $20, like $10, even 20 honestly for these shirts, someone else is paying the cost. That's usually somebody in the line of production being taken advantage of by these fast fashion companies. So I think the most feminist thing is paying for a shirt where everyone is being treated fairly in the process.

Dani's everyday money tip:

And as a slow fashion brand working with really tight margins, which people are always surprised to hear even with the $52 shirts, our margins are tight, making things to order here in LA, so I have to be really careful about our budgeting as a company and where I allocate my time as a small business owner. And something I did with my business coach, which really opened my mind to finances and allocating time was creating a list of how much time you spend doing each task and how much money that task generates. And she had me write down a list, and a couple of things on my list was our online blog. We run a blog, we promote a lot of other female owned businesses, talk about empowerment, and we were spending so much time curating this truly beautiful blog, almost like an article media website. And the truth is not a lot of people are reading our long form content.

And then I wrote down the time I spent on our ambassador program, which is something that generates a lot of money, and I was spending way more time on the blog that wasn't really generating us money and not enough time into our ambassador program. And putting it down on paper and looking at it was like a smack in the face and I realized I needed to better allocate my time. So once every few months, I sit down and kind of write down all the tasks I'm doing and what I'm getting back from those tasks, and I reprioritize the things. It's made a huge impact on our super nimble bootstraps business.

Episode Links:

Dani’s website - www.dazeyla.com

The Forbes article - Why Thousands Of Customers Pay $52 For These T-Shirts

Follow Dani!

• Instagram - @Dazey_LA

• Instagram - @Dazey_Dessert_House

• Instagram - @BizBabez

• Twitter - @dazey_la

• Facebook - @DazeyLA

Cameron Huddleston wrote her new book “Mom and Dad, We Need to Talk. How to Have Essential Conversations With Your Parents About Their Finances” when she found herself confronted with huge issues after not talking to her mom about her money- which she shares on the podcast. The book hits on a huge issue impacting all generations and all income levels. 

Cameron's money story:

Cameron Huddleston:
Yes. I had moved from Washington DC where I was working for Kiplingers Personal Finance magazine. I had moved to my home state of Kentucky, actually across the street from my mom. I said to her, "Mom, I think you need to look into long-term care insurance." She and my father had divorced years before that, and she was living on her own. I knew that if she had any long-term care needs, it would be helpful to have long-term care insurance to help cover those costs. She took my advice-

Bobbi Rebell:
Wait, for people that don't know long-term care insurance is specifically to cover things like a nursing home that you would live in. That kind of thing.

“A big benefit of having a third party involved with these conversations is because your parents might be reluctant to talk to you but they are going to listen to the advice of someone else.”

Cameron Huddleston:
Yes, assisted living, memory care, and in case you don't know this, Medicare does not cover those costs.

Bobbi Rebell:
What's a typical cost of that if somebody or their parents end up having to pay that out of pocket?

Cameron Huddleston:
The average cost of assisted living is about $4,500 a month. That's average. A nursing home is 80-$90,000 a year.

Bobbi Rebell:
Okay, so you moved back home to across the street from your mom, and you're learning about her situation?

Cameron Huddleston:
Yes. I asked her to check in a long-term care insurance. She took my advice. She met with an insurance agent. Unfortunately, she did not qualify for coverage, because she had another preexisting condition that made her too high risk. At that point I should have said, "Okay mom, you can't get long-term care insurance coverage. Let's look at your financial assets, figure out where you stand, and figure out how we would pay for this care if you needed it."

I can look back and say, that's what I should've said, but I didn't. I didn't even think about it at all. Say being what it is, a few years later, she started having trouble with her memory. At that point, I knew I needed to act quickly and talk to her, but because I was already facing a crisis, if I wanted to start talking to her about money, I would have to explain to her why, "Mom, we need to talk about your finances, because I can see you're having trouble with your memory."

I didn't want to have to be the one to tell her that. I didn't care about talking to her about money. That didn't feel like a taboo topic to me. I didn't want to tell her that I thought she was losing her memory. Eventually, with the help of a doctor actually, I got her doctor to suggest that she get tested for dementia, and he did.

During that process I said, "Mom, I think we need to go meet with your attorney and get all your legal documents updated. Because the thing is you have to be competent, mentally competent to sign a will or a living trust, a power of attorney document, and an advanced healthcare directive. If you are no longer competent, you cannot sign those documents."

Then if you get into a situation like my mother did where she is no longer able to make financial and healthcare decisions on her own, if she had not named me power of attorney and healthcare power of attorney, I would have had to go to court, basically put her on trial to prove that she was no longer competent, spent thousands of dollars to get conservatorship for her. I act too quickly. I knew I had to do this. She was still competent enough. I dodged a bullet, but then I had to figure out her finances while she was already forgetting things, and it was so difficult.

Bobbi Rebell:
Right. So how did that work? What did you find?

Cameron Huddleston:
I had to approach it very carefully. I didn't want to look like I was going in and taking over, especially in the early stages of her dementia. I didn't want her to feel like she was losing all of her independence. So I just did things little by little.

One of the benefits of meeting with the attorney was that she suggested that we go to the bank, and put me on her account as her representative payee. That's certainly a big benefit of having a third-party involved with these conversations is because your parents might be reluctant to talk to you, but they're going to listen to the advice of someone else. So the attorney said go to the bank. We took her advice, and then that sort of opened the door to having some more conversations about what role I was going to have to play going forward.

She had all this cash just sitting in her bank account. Fortunately, she had not opened an online account. She was so old fashioned, she never used debit card. She used checks. So I was able to go online and set-up online banking for her and monitor her bank account, because one of the issues that she was having was writing checks to every organization that would send her something in the mail, like organization she had no ties to.

So, I had to make sure she wasn't just spending all her money writing these charitable contribution checks.

Bobbi Rebell:
Which is something that happens to a lot of seniors.

Cameron Huddleston:
Oh yeah, it's a big problem. Then you've got to worry about scammers and stuff. I decided to take that money and put it into an annuity. Not that you or I would necessarily recommend that everyone get an annuity, but I knew that it would be a safe place to put her money. It would earn some interest, hands off for several years, and then use it down the road when I needed it to pay for her care.

Cameron’s money lesson:

Cameron Huddleston:
The lesson is please don't wait to have these conversations with your parents. A lot of people I talk to and hear from say, "Well, I don't need to have this conversation yet. We're not there yet. Mom and dad are still healthy." That is exactly the time you need to have it. You need to have the conversations when your parents are healthy. There's not a financial crisis, there's not a health crisis, because then everyone is entirely competent. Your parents know what assets they have, what they don't have, what legal documents they have.

“You need to have the conversations when your parents are healthy. There is not a financial crisis. There is not a health crisis. Because then everyone is entirely competent.”

You have time to get those legal documents if they don't have them. Emotions are not running high. There's so many more options available to you. If a crisis does arise, you can make a plan for how they are going to age comfortably. You can't do that if there's already a crisis.

Cameron's everyday money tip:

Cameron Huddleston:
I think I have a pretty good tip. It's something that I have done myself. I set-up alerts with my credit card account. It's so easy. You just log onto your account online. There's usually most credit card companies will have a place where you can click on alerts and notifications. I set it up to get alerts every time my credit card is used. The benefit of this is that it alerts you to fraud, which has happened to me.

“If your parents are counting on your to be their caregiver.. wouldn’t you rather know this now .. because you might have to prepare your own finances”

It was really an unfortunate situation. I was at a visitation for a family member who had died, and my phone, it was like a little ding from the message. I looked at it and it said my credit card had been used. Then I got another ding that it was used again and I was like, "Wait a second, I did not make these charges." I got on the phone, called my credit card company and I said, "I think my credit card number has been stolen. I want you to flag these transactions as fraud and I want to cancel my card." Thank goodness for the alerts. I mean, I knew right away that there was something fishy.

In My Take you will learn:

Financial Grownup tip number one:

Make sure proactive decisions are being made about insurance, not just for yourself and your immediate family, but also for anyone who is what I would call stakeholders in your family financial ecosystem. So everyone whose finances could impact yours, only you can decide if you need and at what amount you may need. For example, life insurance, long-term care insurance, healthcare insurance and so on.

Make sure those decisions are being made for everyone that is tied to you financially, because the decisions made or not made can and in many cases, will impact your life. So make sure that the people you care about have the information and that they're making decisions. Because obviously as we always say, not making a decision is actually making a decision. It's just not one that you are aware of all the time.

Financial Grownup tip number two:

If you don't feel comfortable having these conversations now, this is what you need to do. Go through in your mind and play out how things could go if you don't get this done, if you don't have the conversations, what happens? It may give you some motivation.

Bobbi Rebell:
Read Cameron's book for example of the reality of how this goes. For her, it was not perfect but she dodged a bullet as she says, but she gives some examples that will certainly motivate you because things can go very bad, very fast, very unexpectedly and with a very high price tag. Even what seems like the most basic things can be huge stresses at the worst time. As an example, a relative of mine recently passed, and when we visited her husband a few days later, rather than focusing on his own emotional healing, he was actually stressed out just trying to figure out her passwords. I mean, that's terrible.

Episode Links:

Blinkist - The app I’m loving right now. Please use our link to support the show and get a free trial.

Cameron’s website - www.CameronHuddleston.com

Cameron’s Book - Mom and Dad, We Need to Talk: How to Have Essential Conversations With Your Parents About Their Finances

Follow Cameron!

• Facebook - @CameronHuddlestonMoneyExpert

• Twitter - @CHLebedinsky

• LinkedIn

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.

3 dumb things smart people do with their money

• How to avoid taking advice from the wrong people- and how to find the right trusted sources.

• How to protect yourself from identity theft, and avoid doing the dumb things that make you vulnerable.

• How to both avoid spending money on the wrong insurance, and how to know what insurance you do need. Plus how to adjust your insurance as you go through different life stages as a financial grownup.

Episode Links:

• Jill’s book Dumb Things Smart People Do With Their Money

• Website - Jill on Money

• Jill on Money podcast

Follow Jill!

• Twitter - @JillonMoney

• Facebook - @JillonMoney

• Instagram - @JillonMoney

• LinkedIn - @JillonMoney

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.

Journalist Veronica Dagher lost her dad as a young child and grew up watching her mom learn how to manage the family’s business and money. That experience inspired her to not only focus on her own finances, but to build a career around teaching women financial independence.

In Veronica's money story you will learn:

• How the loss of her dad shaped her view of finances and forced her to learn about money management at an early age.

• The financial grownup lesson that Veronica learned from her mother at a young age that has stuck with her

• Learning how to handle your finances now is essential so you are ready and prepared if something tragic happens in your life

In Veronica’s money lesson you will learn:

• How becoming financially literate can really help out your future self

• The reasons Veronica is so passionate about women being financially savvy

In Veronica's everyday money tip you will learn:

• Why she feels that having a positive money mantra that you tell yourself daily is so important

In My Take you will learn:

• The benefits of askng your parents about their money experiences

• How to leverage tough money experiences to make an impact that helps others.

Episode Links:

• Secrets of Wealthy Women podcast

• I Stack Benjamins

Check out Veronica’s stories in The Wall Street Journal

Follow Veronica!

• Instagram - @veronicadagher

• LinkedIn - @veronicadagher

• Twitter - @veronicadagher
  

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

Veronica Dagher:
I would see her crying or upset or frustrated, and just wondering what was going on. I did hear rumblings of "So-and-so tried to, you know, con me into something." Or I would hear little bits and pieces of that once in a while, or some relative would tell me and, not really fully understanding, just knowing that things at times got nasty.

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 gonna get there together.

Bobbi Rebell:
I'm gonna 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:
Hello, financial grownups. The voice you just heard was that of a friend of mine getting a lot of attention recently, because she co-created and hosts one of the hottest podcasts, not just in the business space, but among podcasts overall. It is called "Secrets of Wealthy Women," and, as she will share with us, it really all began with her mom. Welcome to all and, to our newest listeners, thank you for checking out the show.

Bobbi Rebell:
We try to keep the episodes short, but if you have more time, maybe you're commuting, at about 15 minutes each, the episodes are perfect to listen to a few of them, back-to-back, to fit your schedule.

Bobbi Rebell:
Let's get to Veronica. She is an award-winning senior wealth management reporter for the Wall Street Journal. She is also, as I mentioned, the co-creator, host, and co-producer of the top-rated Wall Street Journal's "Secrets of Wealthy Women" podcast. She interviews some of the most well-known women in the world. People like like Gloria Steinem, Bobbi Brown, and Rebecca Minkoff. She also co-produces and hosts videos for wsj.com and is a regular guest on the Fox Business Network and other national media, where she speaks about women, personal finance, markets, the economy, just about anything in the news.

Bobbi Rebell:
As you can tell, I am a huge fan of Veronica's, and I know, if you aren't already, you soon will be, too. Here is Veronica Dagher.

Bobbi Rebell:
Hey, Veronica Dagher. You're a financial grownup. Welcome to the podcast.

Veronica Dagher:
Thanks for having me, Bobbi. Great to be here.

Bobbi Rebell:
I have to first of all thank you because I had the honor of being a guest on your super-popular podcast, "Secrets of Wealthy Women," which you do through your job at the Wall Street Journal. And, just to give everyone a sense of how big this is, this is almost in the top 100 of all podcasts in the entire podcasting universe at this point. It's definitely in the top, I don't know, five or six business podcasts. Your guests include people like Bobbi Brown, Gloria Steinem, Bethany Frankel, a favorite of mine. And, of course, you had a special podcast around New Year's with myself, Jean Chatzky from The Today Show, Farnoush Cherobi from Oprah Magazine and her podcast, "So Money." I should say, Jean Chatzky also has a podcast called "Her Money."

Bobbi Rebell:
And we had Sharon Epperson from CNBC. We had Deirdre Bolton. And you, leading the pack, so congratulations on all of it.

Veronica Dagher:
Thank you so much. It was so great to have you on the show. I loved your episode.

Bobbi Rebell:
Thank you. And you were the co-creator of it. How did you come up with it?

Veronica Dagher:
Well, we came up with it, because we knows there's enormous wealth transfer going on in the United States, with an estimated 33 trillion dollar wealth transfer happening, and women stand to control a lion's share of that money. And I looked around the marketplace, and I didn't see a whole lot of products or content, so to speak, that spoke to women in an inspirational, relatable way. So we figured, "Hey, let's do a podcast that we can connect with women by shining the light on some very famous women and what they've done to advance their own careers and make smart decisions about their money."

Veronica Dagher:
And so that's why we said, "Let's really feature women who can serve as aspirational role models for women, and, at the same time, teach them a little bit more about advancing their careers and improving their financial health."

Bobbi Rebell:
You are such a role model. A lot of your success comes from early experiences in life, and the strength that you acquired from them, and some tough times. And you're gonna share a very special money story that has to do with a loss early in your life and how that shaped your view of the world and the way that you live your life.

Veronica Dagher:
That's right. When I was 11 years old, my dad died suddenly and left my mom a widow. She was in her 40s at the time, which is younger than the average widowhood in the United States, which I think is about 59, so she was in her 40s at the time, left with an 11-year-old and a 13-year-old, my brother being the 13-year-old. And she did not understand where our accounts were. She didn't understand how to write a check. She didn't know anything about the finances of the family at all.

Veronica Dagher:
And, when my dad died, she was left scrambling. He had businesses. He had different investments. And she didn't understand any of that, and so that meant, at the worst possible time in her life, she had to learn about money and investing, learn about personal finance. And so I have these memories of her sitting at the kitchen table with some of her friends and some of my aunts, them trying to teach her, "Okay, this is how you write a check. Let's open these account statements. Let's see where these different accounts are. Let's try to understand what's happening here. Here's what you have to do in terms of deal with the business now that he's gone. Here's what you have to do with some of the accounts and the money that he was owed as a business person."

Bobbi Rebell:
Wow. So you were in it together. What was his business?

Veronica Dagher:
He was a lawyer, but he had his own law firm, and then he had several real estate holdings and some real estate interests and, also, just some other consulting type work. And so he had a lot of different tentacles to what he, day in and day out. And he had a staff and all these sorts of things as well. And so it was a lot to manage and a lot to understand, not to mention the family's personal finances and understanding the different accounts and other assets he had acquired through those years.

Veronica Dagher:
And my mom really didn't know that much about any of it, and so she had to learn, like I said, at the worst possible time, and it was a really steep, difficult learning curve for her. And there were times when financial advisors who, some of them meant well, but then some of 'em were pretty shady, try to approach her and try to get her to invest in things that were completely inappropriate.

Bobbi Rebell:
Like what? Were you aware of it at this time? Did she share with you guys what was going on, or were you kept out of it?

Veronica Dagher:
Yeah, slightly. I think a lot of it's stuff I heard, after the fact, when I was a little bit older. But I would see her crying or upset or frustrated, and just wondering what was going on. I did hear rumblings of "So-and-so tried to, you know, con me into something." Or I would hear little bits and pieces of that once in a while, or some relative would tell me and, not really fully understanding, just knowing that things at times got nasty.

Veronica Dagher:
And understanding that, sometimes, money brings out the best in people, but also the absolute worst in people as well, and that you need to be careful with who you trust and who you give your money to. Luckily, my mom had enough sense to listen to her gut instinct, even though she wasn't exactly an investing pro at the time. She had enough sense to understand who was trustworthy, who's not trustworthy. She got that part of it. And so, luckily, she didn't make any bad investments and, you know, it's not exactly always how you wanna be spending your time, but, to her credit, she learned and she would ... Even when I was a teenager, she started telling me, 'cause she was getting more savvy as each year went on. And she said, "You need to be financially savvy. You need to learn this stuff, 'cause I never want you to be in the position that I'm in."

Veronica Dagher:
And she would almost lecture me, like, "You have to be a financially independent woman. You must. You can't rely on anyone. You have to understand all this stuff." And I was like, "Oh, why is she so adamant about this?" Even though I knew the history, I felt like, "Oh, things will work out." And she was like, "No, you always need to know where everything is. You need to understand how to write that check." And I think I ... I forget how old I was when I got my first checks. I wanna say, maybe when I went to college. But she sat down with me and showed me how to write a check. She sat down with me and emphasized, "You always pay your credit card bills on time. If you don't, and if you go over a certain amount, I'm not gonna bail you out. You need to be able to pay your bill on your own. I'm not a bank. This is your responsibility."

Veronica Dagher:
She was very much focused on making me a financial grownup, as you would appreciate. And she said, when I got my first job out of college, too, she said, "You max out your 401(k). You open up that 401(k), and you contribute as much as you possibly can. You just start doing that at 21 or 22, however old you are when you get your first job."

Veronica Dagher:
And I remember thinking, "Oh, no, it's so young." And she's like, "No, you have to do it." And I listened. I said, "Okay, I'll do it." And I didn't really ... I thought everybody was doing it. And it's only after the fact that I realized not everybody got that message, unfortunately, but, luckily, she gave that message to me, and that helped me.

Bobbi Rebell:
She was a great role model.

Veronica Dagher:
Really.

Bobbi Rebell:
What is the takeaway for our listeners here?

Veronica Dagher:
I think women should really try to become financially independent. Women themselves. And take ownership of their finances, and it doesn't have to be so overwhelming. But the point is not to have to learn at the worst possible time whether that's your divorce or whether you become a widow or some other situation. Maybe you don't even get married. You can't wait around for someone else to do it for you. So start learning. Take it, piece by piece. So maybe it's 10 minutes every week you spend learning about finance. You read an article. You read a chapter of a book. You join a group that talks about money and investing.

Veronica Dagher:
You take one small step towards becoming more financially savvy, so that way you are in control of what you own and what you owe and what you're invested in, and you can become more independent as time goes on. Now, even if you don't like it, that's okay. You don't have to love everything you do. You have to brush your teeth. You may not love brushing your teeth, but it helps you feel more secure, and I think, ultimately, many women, just from some of the studies that are out there, say their biggest fear is becoming a bag lady.

Veronica Dagher:
I understand, but one way to alleviate the possibility of that happening is to take a more active role in your finances. So think about your future self. Do this for her.

Bobbi Rebell:
Such great advice. Also great advice is your everyday money tip, which we talked about before we started taping. And I'm still thinking about mine. But share with us your everyday money tip, Veronica.

Veronica Dagher:
I like the idea of having a positive money mantra, however you say it. But having a positive message you say to yourself day in, day out. So, for example, a message might be, "I am good with my money." And the reason you wanna say a positive message to yourself regularly is, there's a good chance that maybe something from your childhood has told you a negative message about yourself, and that may or may not be true.

Veronica Dagher:
And so, if you wanna create a positive, more abundant future reality, I think it's very important to have a positive mantra that you can reframe your view of yourself and your view of money. Because if you keep saying the negative, it almost becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. But if you say the positive, I think you have a much better chance of achieving the financial abundance and success that you really want.

Bobbi Rebell:
So what is yours?

Veronica Dagher:
Mine is actually, "I am good with money, and I respect cash."

Bobbi Rebell:
I love that. Alright, I'm gonna give mine some thought. Before we wrap up, you have an e-book coming out. Tell us.

Veronica Dagher:
Yes. I'm super excited. We are doing an e-book based on the "Secrets of Wealthy Women" podcast here at the Wall Street Journal. And so we're profiling 20 women we've had on the podcast, talking about some of the inspirational stories that they have shared with us and giving some money and career tips, and that is slated to come out this March in e-book form on wsj.com.

Veronica Dagher:
So we're super excited about that and, hopefully, we'll have a lot more to share about that in the coming weeks, but I'm busy writing it, and I'm super excited that it's happening.

Bobbi Rebell:
I love it. I can't wait. Give us all your social channels and where people can find you besides wsj.com, which is where the e-book will be.

Veronica Dagher:
Yes. Thank you. So, on Instagram and Twitter, @veronicadagher, and on LinkedIn. I'm there as well, if you wanna contact me there. But Instagram and Twitter are the best places to get me.

Bobbi Rebell:
Thank you, Veronica.

Veronica Dagher:
Thank you for having me.

Bobbi Rebell:
Love all those stories. I'm still thinking about what my money mantra is going to be. Maybe everyone can share with me on social what you're thinking might be yours, at least maybe for 2019. Maybe we can all change them each year to kinda keep it fresh, but I'm thinking hard. I'll get back to you guys.

Bobbi Rebell:
Let's get to our tips.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial Grownup Tip Number One: Talk to your parents about their money experiences. I was really touched by how Veronica's mom protected her from knowing everything going on when she was just too young to know everything. She obviously knew some things.

Bobbi Rebell:
But I was always so impressed that the mother-daughter relationship evolved, and her mom clearly communicated more as Veronica grew up about their experiences coping with the financial struggles connected to losing Veronica's dad at such a young age.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial Grownup Tip Number Two: If you are looking to make a meaningful impact in some aspect of your life, look to the things that shaped who you are as a financial grownup, as Veronica has done with "Secrets of Wealthy Women." Veronica not only gained strength from her experiences, after losing her father, who was the breadwinner, she has now taken that to create something that will have a much broader impact.

Bobbi Rebell:
Thanks to everyone for joining us. If you have not, please do subscribe, and, of course, tell a friend. I wanna hear what has inspired your interest in learning about money. Follow me, and please DM me your thoughts on Instagram, @bobbirebell1. On Twitter, @bobbirebell, and you can always email at hello@financialgrownup.com. And check out my new show with Stacking Benjamin's Joe Saul-Sehy. It is called "Money in the Morning." It's in all the usual podcast places, and we tape live on Facebook Live. Go to "I Stack Benjamins" on Facebook, and you can set up notifications for when we tape. We take live comments, so you can be part of the show.

Bobbi Rebell:
And we will leave a link to that in the show notes, as well.

Bobbi Rebell:
Everyone, check out "Secrets of Wealthy Women," if you have not already. Big thanks to the fabulous Veronica Dagher for helping us all get one step closer to being financial grownups.

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

There are lots of money challenges with living abroad starting with just how do you even manage your money? Do you need to open a foreign bank account? Tess Wicks joins Bobbi from Italy to co-host this Financial Grownup Guide

3 Money Tips for Living Abroad

• Depending on your plans and the country you are traveling to, make sure you are legally allowed to be there

• Why it's so important to know what the financial requirements are to move to another country

• Why it's not only important to understand the currency conversion, but also to also find a credit card that has zero transaction fees

Episode Links:

• Wander Wealthy

• Day in the life with Tess on Instagram

In this Financial Grownup podcast episode we talk about the 3 money tips for living abroad. #LivingAbroadForAYear #LivingAbroadTips

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.

Wander Wealthy’s Tess Wicks shares her early interest in investing in the stock market, how Warren Buffett inspired her, the advice her family gave her and what got her to actually make her first investment. Her every day money tip will resonate with fans of Marie Kondo who are tired of feeling overwhelmed by their belongings. 

In Tess' money story you will learn:

• The reason she felt like she was starting to invest late at the age of 22

• What Dollar Cost Averaging is and why you might want to invest this way

• Why investing may feel overcomplicated, but it can actually be really easy

In Tess’ money lesson you will learn:

• You may never feel ready but it's important to just jump in anyway

• Why the younger you start investing, the better it is for you in the long run

In Tess' everyday money tip you will learn:

• How creating a capsule wardrobe can not only help you save money, but may bring more joy to your life in the spirit of Marie Kondo

In My Take you will learn:

• Why it's important to realize that you must actually start the clock in order to have time on your side

• Just because you have a lot of space for more stuff, that doesn't mean you need to fill that space with stuff

Episode Links:

Learn more about Value Investing!

Financial Grownup Guest Danielle Town is one of my favorite resources.

This is a great piece on value investing from one of my favorite websites Investopedia!

Check out Tess' Invested program and website -

• The Invested Program

• Wander Wealthy

Follow Tess!

• Instagram

• LinkedIn

• Twitter

• Facebook

• YouTube

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

Tess Wicks:
After doing that it opened up the whole world of money to me; it really helped me see the possibility of money and what's really important here is that you don't need to be ready, you don't need to know all of the facts, you just have to dive in.

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 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 Financial Grownup friends, we are going global here at Financial Grownup to Italy for this episode, virtually of course. It is a podcast, come on guys, you know we weren't really going.

Bobbi Rebell:
Tess Wicks, you may know her from her blog, her podcast and her super fun, and honestly, extremely informative and educational, YouTube channel, all under the brand, Wonder Wealthy. She moved to Italy for love, but she's also building her own entrepreneurial venture which we talk about in our interview. Tess is someone that I've been impressed with for quite some time from afar, and I was really excited to get to talk to her about her proactive approach to investing and creating systems so that we can all stay on track to meet our financial goals. Very appropriate for the beginning of the year, even if you do something you never plan to do like move to Europe. No excuses, just different opportunities. Here is Tess Wicks.

Bobbi Rebell:
Hey Tess Wicks, you're a financial grown-up, welcome to the podcast.

Tess Wicks:
Thank you so much Bobbi. I'm so excited to be here.

Bobbi Rebell:
Well I'm excited that you're here because I am such a fan of Wander Wealthy, which is your brand, it is on YouTube, where you're ... I'm sorry to use this term, but you're so adorable. You have buddy tips that even I don't know which is truly brilliant, and of course you have your podcast, so congratulations on it all.

Tess Wicks:
Thank you so much, it's really wonderful to hear coming from you, someone who's been on TV, now doing radio podcast stuff.

Bobbi Rebell:
Well you're a natural of all of it, and you have so many great things in the works and I'm gonna give a little teaser after your money story and everyday money tip. We're gonna give everyone a sneak peek to something new that they can be a part of. But first let's get to your money story which is really appropriate because here we are, we're taping this in January, this has been a very stressful and a bit of a rollercoaster ride for anyone that is interested in investing and the stock market, and it's something that even I find a bit overwhelming, whether or not to put new money in, what to do with the money that you have. Your money story has to do with a big decision you made to just get started, go for it.

Tess Wicks:
Yes, absolutely so I started investing right out of college and that to me felt late because I was majoring in Actuarial Science and Finance in college, so I was supposed to be the money expert here, I supposed to know my stuff and I remember going through my portfolio, investing class in college, I think it was my senior year, it was full of just guys and they all seemed like they knew what they were doing, and I was so confused but I knew that investing was something that people did, especially wealthy people, and someone I really looked up to, well first when I was younger, was my brother who is seven years older than me and he started investing when he was 12, so I was very behind compared to him. And I would ask my dad all the time about investing and he would try and explain it to me while we were driving in his truck and I just never could get it. And then of course college happened and then I started looking up to Warren Buffet cos one of my professors made us read us every single one of his letters to shareholders for Berkshire Hathaway. So if you know anything about Warren Buffet, then you're probably a fan too.

Bobbi Rebell:
Right, he is all about value investing. We'll leave some links to help you look and learn about value investing and Warren Buffett.

Tess Wicks:
Yes, so I actually remember so I was sitting, we had this little TV room that all the kids would pile into, I'm one of four, when I was little. And I'm sitting there after college and I'm about to leave on a big, not around the world, but I was going to go on a trip to New Zealand to [inaudible 00:04:35] myself solo, traveling the world, and I was but I know there's something I need to do first, and that was to make my first investment.

Tess Wicks:
And I had no idea where to start. All I knew was wealthy people invested. I asked my brother how to open up an investment account, and he was "Just choose one, Saber, Vanguard, whatever." I basically knew that I needed to invest in, or I thought what would be good and smart for me at the time, was to invest in some sort of index mimicking, exchange traded fund or a mutual fund. So those were all that I knew.

Tess Wicks:
And the thing and the reason that I wanted to tell this story is that I just did it. I didn't even know what the stock market looked like at the time; I didn't know a lot about investing, but I just did it. I was 22 years old and I just did it. After doing that, it opened up the whole world of money to me; it really helped me see the possibilities of money and what's really important here is that you don't need to be ready, you don't need to know all of the facts, you just have dive in, and especially when you are young, you have that time.

Bobbi Rebell:
What is the one thing that happened that finally pulled the trigger on it for you?

Tess Wicks:
There wasn't one thing except this build up of pressure of saying, I'm supposed to know this stuff, so I'm just gonna do it so I can get that experience, and maybe once I get the experience, I'll figure it out after that.

Bobbi Rebell:
And did you put systems in place? Did you put in any kind of automatic investing? Dollar cost averaging? What's been your general system since then?

Tess Wicks:
Okay, well at that time no. I had saved up a chunk of money during my internship during school, and was like, I know this is enough to open an account so I'm gonna go, and at that time, nothing, I literally let that investment stay put and I never really touched it until two or three years later. But in that two or three year timeframe, after I got back from my summer trip and I started my work full-time, my brother, the investing guru had told me about [Roble 00:06:40] advisors and I actually opened a Roble advisor account and then I started regularly investing in that, along with of course my 401 cape through my employers. So I was taking advantage of dollar cost averaging which is just investing on a regular basis, once a month I think, was my timeline and I had set a couple of goals cos with Roble advisors you can do that as well. I knew I wanted to invest for the long term because I want to be really rich in 20, 30, 40 years, and I think I wanted to buy an investment property. I was very future oriented when I was 22, so that's what I did.

Bobbi Rebell:
And what is your takeaway for our listeners, especially those who are sitting here, knowing like you did that they should be investing but they're watching the market and they're thinking, well I don't want to put money into a market that keeps going down. As we're taping here, I have a screen to the side of me and the market is down today again.

Tess Wicks:
Yes, okay so first of all, anything you wanna do, when it comes to money or anything else, you never are going to feel ready, you just have to jump in. So that's my one, number one of that, is just, you just have to suck it up. But if you're looking at the market specifically, something that I realized, and there's a lot of historical data and different reports that you can look up about this, is if you miss 10 or 20 of the best trading days in the market, in a 15 year increment, your returns get cut significantly. The thing is, we don't know when those best trading days are going to be. It could be literally tomorrow so if you get in today you can capture a really great trading day tomorrow. But we don't know when that's going to happen, so the best time to get invested is when you just have money and you are financially capable to be investing, meaning you have an emergency savings fund, your high interest debt is being taken care of, hopefully paid off, and now you feel financially able to put some money into the market.

Tess Wicks:
And the younger you are, the better, because the longer timeframe you have to maybe have those investments lose a little bit of money, and then maybe make some money and of course at the end of the day the trend has historically been upwards so if you can do that, you should be okay.

Bobbi Rebell:
Your everyday money tip is genius because you, for those folks who don't know that much about you, you moved across the world to Italy for love, and when you move you can't bring everything but that's a good thing when it comes to your everyday money tip, go for it.

Tess Wicks:
Yeah my everyday money tip is to create a capsule wardrobe or if you want to be more general, you can just downsize, whether it's your wardrobe or the things in your house. Even if you have a lot of space for stuff, I find that when we downsize and we make it a high priority to find things that we love to keep in our home, we're then able to save more money by setting some really high requirements for what we bring into our lives. And it just makes you way more aware about the things you already have, how you can make good use of them, and when you feel like you're tempted to spend, you'll probably second guess a lot of the time and then you won't necessarily spend as much money.

Bobbi Rebell:
Which is a good thing, especially when so many pieces are in motion.

Bobbi Rebell:
You have a new program starting this winter that I think is a really innovative approach to what we just talked about, to investing and to making sure to put yourself and your future and the money you'll have in the future, as a priority. Tell us more about the Invested Program.

Tess Wicks:
Yeah so the Invested Program is a six module program where I give you the information that you need but also the steps that you can take and implement in your life to create a personalized prudent investment strategy for yourself. Now I'm a big index investor kind of girl. I like to base my investment strategy off of research, especially Nobel Prize winning research and theories that have worked in the past.

Bobbi Rebell:
You're so intense Tess! Oh my God!

Bobbi Rebell:
Sorry, keep going. Oh my gosh.

Tess Wicks:
That's what I like to teach cos I want people to feel confident that they know what they're doing. Cos I think what holds you back lots of times especially when it comes to investing, is it is just way over complicated by the media, by a lot of people on Wall Street, even by your Great Uncle Gary. You think, oh my gosh I can never figure out what's gonna be good or what's gonna be bad, and it's scary when things are unclear and when you don't have that confidence. So in the program I really try and fill people with confidence and give them the things they need to know and how investing can actually be really easy. And then on top of that, I have a live bonus module where you get to watch me invest twice a week, from here til in the future, so you can see me putting the strategies I teach into action and I think that really helps people gain confidence and see that it really does work.

Bobbi Rebell:
Well it also gives you the confidence that even though the market can be such a rollercoaster, that doesn't mean you can't control your investments and still make it work for you.

Tess Wicks:
Exactly and there is obviously very important criteria that you'll put in place for yourself to meet your needs.

Bobbi Rebell:
Love that. And I love the fact that you do so much of the research behind the scenes and then filter it down and then deliver exactly what people need to know, and not everything. Because as you said, sometimes things are made so complicated that we just can't get it done; it's just not happening because there's too much.

Tess Wicks:
Yes absolutely.

Bobbi Rebell:
Okay Tess, tell us where we can learn more about the Investor program and you and Wander Wealthy and all the things.

Tess Wicks:
Yes, so you can find all of my content at Wonderwealthy.com. There's links to my YouTube channel, to the podcast and if you wanna learn more about the Invested program, it's actually gonna officially launching early February, but you can get into, I have a free investing bootcamp; it's ten days, you get e-emails and we start getting you into the investing world, and you can go to Wonderwealthy.com/invest to sign up.

Bobbi Rebell:
I love that, and I love that you feel like you are part of a team and a group and that gets you motivated, because sometimes in the new year, we have all of those goals, we need that. We need to feel that accountability.

Tess Wicks:
Yes.

Bobbi Rebell:
All right. Tess Wicks, thank you so much. Love it all. I'll keep watching Wander Wealthy and I love your podcast and I'm excited to see the Invested Program. Thank you.

Tess Wicks:
Thanks so much Bobbi.

Bobbi Rebell:
All right friends, lets get right to it. Here is my take. Financial Grownup tip, number one: time is only on your side if you actually start the clock. Now this is one clock we all want to be ticking. Saving money is not enough as Tess points out. There is never gonna be an obvious time to start investing, so you have to start. Make sure to invest the money that you have allocated to investing; no sitting on the sidelines for every. You can wait a little. I would say if you're cautious, dollar cost invest, averaging everything out to smooth the ups and downs, that means putting a set amount of money into the market at set intervals so that you don't get the highs and lows. You also don't get all the highs when you're avoiding the lows, but so be it. The point is, start the clock, start the timer, get going, just like Tess says.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial Grownup tip number two: I love that Tess talked about downsizing our stuff and most of us have too much, that's the truth of it, which is so appropriate given that many of us are watching the [inaudible 00:14:23] Show on Tidying up on Netflix. Just because you have enough space for more stuff and you're not going abroad like Tess is, doesn't mean that you need to buy and keep things to fill all the space. Make sure you know where things are. That's something I have a hard time with myself even though I live in an apartment, I put things away in a safe place and then I don't know where they are. And then you know what happens? You can't find it and you buy another one. And then what happens? You find the original item. So lets all work towards getting past that and only having the things we want, need or see a need for realistically in the future, getting more organized so we don't buy things we already have.

Bobbi Rebell:
I would love to hear from you about your experience, your first experience investing or if it hasn't happened yet, what is keeping you from it? And how can we all get started, finding our starting line and getting things going? Be in touch on all the socials, at Instagram at bobbirebell1, on Twitter at Bobbi Rebell, my Facebook page is Bobbi Rebbell and you can email me at Hello@FinancialGrownup.com. And by the way, I mention my Facebook page because something interesting is happening on Facebook, specifically Facebook Live with a new project that I have been alluding to a little bit here. I've talked about it a couple of times, but if you have not already, please check out my new podcast, a second podcast, Financial Grownup's not going anywhere, it is called Money in the Morning, it is with my dear friend Joe Saul-Sehy, you may know him from Stacking Benjamin's fame. We tape live on the Stacking Benjamin's Facebook page at IstackBenjamins and there is audience participation.

Bobbi Rebell:
So I hope you guys will join us, we read your comments live and it's a really really fun thing to do if you have some time. We're gonna start posting a specific schedule in advance there and I'll also be sure to share it on my socials as well. And big thanks to the inspiring Tess Wicks of Wanderwealthy for helping us all get one step closer to being financial grown-ups.

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

Attorney Leslie Tayne shares her unique take on why we should view debt as a good thing, along with candid details on why she ended an engagement over money issues

In Leslie's money story you will learn:

• What kinds of things are red flags financially when dating someone

• The different approach she took with debt management

• What a "Bird and Fish issue" is and why it's important to steer clear of this kind of relationship financially
  

In Leslie’s money lesson you will learn:

• Why it's important not to rely on someone else to take care of your money

In Leslie's everyday money tip you will learn:

• How to put a positive spin on your debt

In My Take you will learn:

• Why it's important to ask uncomfortable questions when getting serious with someone

• What the difference is between secrets vs baggage when it comes to money

Episode Links-

Leslie's book Life & Debt: A Fresh Approach to Achieving Financial Wellness

Check out Leslie's website - https://attorney-newyork.com/

Follow Leslie!

• Instagram - @taynelawgroup

• LinkedIn

• Twitter - @lesliehtayneesq / @taynelawgroup

• Facebook

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

Leslie Tayne:
I am a big believer in saying thank you to your debt because you gain something from that. So let's say you had student loan debt. I'm thankful for my student loan debt because it got me my career and my law degree.

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 gonna get there together. I'm gonna 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. So the clip that you heard at the top was a big moment for me. I had never really thought of debt as something that was actually a symbol of things that that debt had allowed you to achieve. To help you get to your goals. And we don't always think of debt that way. It's a mindset and we're gonna come back to that. First, welcome to everyone. Especially to our new listeners. Let me tell you a little bit about the show. We interview high achievers that share personal stories about money that had an impact on their lives. We also give you every day money tips that you can put to work right away. In this case, as I mentioned, we're gonna be learning how to change our debt mindset. Now, the fantastic guest for this episode is Leslie Tayne. She is the author of Life and Debt. Also an attorney. And before we get to that every day money tip, she gets very real in her money story about a broken engagement. And you're also gonna hear some information about my own break up that was a little bit scary for me to talk about. My own broken marriage. We actually went through with the engagement. Did get married. And things did not work out. And a lot had to do with our different money mindsets. Here we go. With Leslie Tayne.

Bobbi Rebell:
Hey, Leslie Tayne. You're on Financial Grownup. Welcome to the Podcast.

Leslie Tayne:
Thank you so much for having me today.

Bobbi Rebell:
I have you on for a number of reasons. One of which is you know a lot about a lot of financial things. You are the author of Life and Debt. A fresh approach to achieving financial wellness. Congratulations on the book.

Leslie Tayne:
Thank you so much.

Bobbi Rebell:
Tell me a little bit about it.

Leslie Tayne:
I don't think, from my perspective, that it's realistic to really be out of debt. I think that it's a different mindset when it comes to debt resolution, which is learning to love your debt and accept it. So I took this totally different approach about debt management, debt resolution. Whatever concept you want to call it. But I took a totally different approach which is to learn to love your debt, accept it, know that it's part of your life, and find really good strategic ways to manage it so it works for you.

Bobbi Rebell:
Love that. Because it's not always realistic to just say I'm not gonna have it. We have to live in the real world. And part of living in the real world is being realistic about relationships, which is hard to do when we're caught up in things like engagements and all that goes with it. And I know I had a short marriage in my 20s, which broke up for a number of reasons. But money, as is the case in many marriages, our different money values was a factor. And that was also a factor in a big decision that you made.

Leslie Tayne:
Yes, it was. I actually was also engaged to somebody. And I ended the engagement due to what I'm gonna call bird and fish issues related to finances.

Bobbi Rebell:
Alright. That's a good tease. What does that mean?

Leslie Tayne:
So bird and fish issues have to do with my conceptualization of the differences between people's ideas of money. For example, if you're a spender and your significant other is a saver and you really like to spend and don't think about it and your significant other is a saver, you have bird and fish issues. So obviously a bird can't live in the water and a fish doesn't live in a tree. So when you have significant bird and fish issues from a financial perspective, your relationship, unless you can really manage it, is not likely to succeed in that particular area.

Leslie Tayne:
So with my significant other at the time, my fiancé, we just did not see ... And he was a great guy. It wasn't the person. It really had to do with the fact that from a financial perspective, he saw things very differently than I did. And it wasn't something that I felt would make a successful long-term relationship.

Bobbi Rebell:
So what were the red flags?

Leslie Tayne:
I needed to get a new car. And I'm not sure what's on my credit. And then that starts the red flag stuff for me. The I'm not sure what's on-

Bobbi Rebell:
Did you ask his credit score?

Leslie Tayne:
I told him that I thought it was in his best interest to pull his credit and take a look at it and make sure that there was nothing on there that he wasn't aware of.

Bobbi Rebell:
Did you find out what the number was?

Leslie Tayne:
Yeah. I did see his credit later on in the relationship. The ultimate issue was about how he managed his money. Meaning he made money and he told me basically what he was earning, and his job, and his prospect for more money because another big discussion always was around Christmas time or the end of the year bonuses. So the question was, he would always say, "I wonder what I'm gonna get. Is it gonna be like it was last year? And I have to put that money away for taxes. And I need to do this or that with it." So he was volunteering that information to me and then I would follow up with questions based on his volunteering that. And there was a little bit of recklessness there and-

Bobbi Rebell:
What's an example of that?

Leslie Tayne:
Spending without thinking. Like having 100 pairs of jeans. Just continuing to buy without thinking. And then saying, "Oh, I have to pay off my ..." Things that ... These are red flags to me. Excessive spending. Not budgeting. Not being sure how you're gonna make it through the year if you're on salary plus commission. Those are red flags and problems to me. That's a money management issue. It became problematic when I would hear things like, "I don't think I can afford that." Well, you should know what you should be able to afford or not be able to afford. Or, "How could I just say no to my kids?"

Bobbi Rebell:
So what were examples of that happening?

Leslie Tayne:
Vacations. So if I wanted to go on vacation and say I have a different budget than he has or at least I'm aware of my budget than he had. I want to go on vacation and this is what I would like to stay. Then I don't know if I can do that. And I would say, "Well, why would you have a problem doing it based on the things that you told me?"

Bobbi Rebell:
In other words, based on his income, he should be able to afford it, but where was the money going I guess is what you were wondering.

Leslie Tayne:
Correct. Correct. And it wasn't my place. I didn't feel comfortable that it was my place to micromanage it. Again, I don't want to be in a position in relationships and I don't recommend being in a position where you are micromanaging somebody else's inability to manage their own money. Going into a relationship as adults, each one of you should be managing your money effectively and being aware of your finances, being aware of your debt, having some sort of plan. It doesn't have to be a written dissertation of exactly how to pay it off. But an idea, not when I get some money I'm gonna do this. Or I'll have some money soon. There was a dishonesty piece about not telling me what was going on with the finances and with his finances. There came a point when we were engaged when I said, "I'm not just a girlfriend now. We're engaged and we're talking about a long-term future. So I feel like I have a right to understand or have a good understanding of what your finances are." And when there was a hesitation about giving me that information, I knew at that point that I would not be able to proceed.

Bobbi Rebell:
What is your advice to our listeners?

Leslie Tayne:
My best advice is that you may love this person. You may find so many wonderful qualities about them. They may be a great parent. A loving human being. But when you go into a situation where there's any level of dishonesty, that doesn't get better. That gets worse. So those are red flags. Be brave and strong. It's not easy to break off a relationship for a million different reasons. But take your time. Go slow. If you're the one with the money or you're the one with the better credit, always keep it separate and really create a line in the sand-

Bobbi Rebell:
Leslie, tell us your every day money tip. It has to do with debt, but appreciation. And not appreciation in the idea of interest appreciating. A better kind of appreciation.

Leslie Tayne:
I am a big believer in saying thank you to your debt because you gain something from that. So let's say you had student loan debt. I'm thankful for my student loan debt because it got me my career and my law degree. So I know that sounds like a challenging statement to make. But once you change your attitude and you become thankful for the debts that you have, you'd be surprised how that impacts the totality of resolving your own finances.

Bobbi Rebell:
Because many times, they did help you achieve something. Whether it's having a home, having a law degree, whatever it may be.

Leslie Tayne:
Yes. You're correct. All of the debt that you have helps you achieve something. You have a car, it takes you places. You have a home, you have a roof over your head. You have food that you bought maybe on credit. You have student loans from an education that you got. It's not that you didn't get something for nothing. You exchanged the debt for something that may not be tangible. But it's something that is useful in your life.

Bobbi Rebell:
Absolutely. So, Leslie, tell us a little bit more before we wrap up about your practice because it is concentrated on debt. And where people can find you and learn more about you.

Leslie Tayne:
Sure. So I'm an attorney licensed to practice law in the state of New York. And I have a practice called [inaudible 00:09:45] Law Group. We have four offices in New York. But we do help clients outside of New York as well. And we're gonna be opening offices soon in South Florida.

Bobbi Rebell:
Congratulations.

Leslie Tayne:
Thank you. I have a book called Life and Debt. And all of that can be found online. So you can Google me at Leslie Tayne. T-A-Y-N-E. You can find me on Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, all under that. Or LifeandDebtBook.com. TayneLaw.com. T-A-Y-N-E-L-A-W.com. And certainly, again, you can always Google my name, Leslie Tayne, and you'll find me all over.

Bobbi Rebell:
Thank you so much, Leslie for sharing such a candid and brave, frankly, brave story. We appreciate it.

Leslie Tayne:
Thank you for having me. I appreciate it.

Bobbi Rebell:
Hey, friends. Before we get to my take on what Leslie had to say, I just want everyone to know Leslie is happily remarried, as am I. And in both cases, our husbands are on board when it comes to our money mindsets.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial Grownup tip number one. This one's a little bit hard though, actually. You have to ask really uncomfortable questions if you are going to get serious with someone. I got engaged to my ex-husband. The one that I talked about at the beginning of the interview with Leslie. I didn't know his income. I didn't feel comfortable asking. Seriously. For real. But yet, I was willing to be financial partners with him. Without having that information. That is a don't. We'll leave it at that.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial Grownup tip number two. Secrets versus baggage. They are very different. Here's the deal, guys. Leslie's problem with her ex-fiancé was not only that they had different money values because they definitely did. It was the secrets though. It was the lack of honesty. Withholding information. That is not the same as having baggage. AKA having lived a life. Things happen. You might have a student loan or even credit card debt. We're all human. Life is messy. Good luck finding someone who is perfect financially. Pretty much any money problem though can be solved if you work together and are honest with each other. Emphasis on honest. So don't confuse life's normal messiness with the stuff that matters. And that is communication and working through financial situations together. No one's perfect.

Bobbi Rebell:
On that note, so grateful to Leslie Tayne. She got candid, and real, and raw. And we're so much better for it. So thank you for 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

Grant Sabatier was ready to retire at age 30 with over a million dollars saved - in large part by being mindful of his big expenses. The the author of "Financial Freedom: A Proven Path to All the Money You Will Ever Need” shocked many followers by moving to New York City, one of the most expensive cities in the world. 

In Grant's money story you will learn:

• The reason behind Grant's controversial to move from Chicago to the more expensive NYC- despite it's impact on his FIRE goals

• How much more expensive NYC really is compared to Chicago if you apply Grant's money strategies

• Why he feels NYC lifestyle justifies the higher cost

• One thing he loves that is actually less expensive in NYC than it was in Chicago

• The surprising differences he found in cost of living between the two cities.

In Grant’s money lesson you will learn:

• Why he feels that "money only matters when you can live a life you love"

• The things you can do to retire in 10-20 years or less

• Why he feels that cutting out the small things that bring us joy isn't necessarily the best way to save

• The best areas in budgeting you can save your money in

In Grant's everyday money tip you will learn:

• The exact questions he asks himself-and you should before making a purchase to determine it's true cost and value

• Where to find resources to make the calculations yourself

In My Take you will learn:

• How using a calculator can help to change your mindset

• Why it's important to not get caught up in the labels and trends

Episode links:

• Grant's book - Financial Freedom: A Proven Path to All the Money You Will Ever Need

• Financial Freedom book trailer

• Financial Freedom podcast

Check out Grant's websites -

• Millennial Money

• Financial Freedom Book

Follow Grant!

• Instagram @MillennialMoneyCom and @FinancialFreedom

• LinkedIn

• Twitter @MillennialMoney

• Facebook

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

Speaker 1:
What kind of life do you want to live is the most important question. And then the second question is, okay, how much money do you need to live that life?

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 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.

Bobbi Rebell:
Hey Financial Grownup friends. So excited about this episode. Amazing guests we have here, Grant Sabatier. He is the author of the new book Financial Freedom, a Proven Path to All the Money You Will Ever Need. That sounds pretty good. He is also known as the creator of Millennial Money and as you will hear, he went from having just a couple of bucks to his name to being a millionaire. In fact, having more than a million bucks by following the principles of the FIRE movement. By the way that stands for financial independence, retire early.

Bobbi Rebell:
Grant also came up with a lot of new ideas of his own that he put to work to reach his goals. He recently did something very controversial and surprising to many people in the FIRE movement. In fact, I personally was totally caught off guard and thought I heard it wrong because it just didn't make sense that he of all people would do this. More in a sec.

Bobbi Rebell:
First, a quick hello to everyone. We have a lot of new listeners in the new year, so welcome. We interview high achievers here on the Financial Grownup Podcast who share many stories that we can all learn from along with everyday money tips. And we keep it short so you can stack a few episodes together to fit your commute, your workout or whatever you're up to.

Bobbi Rebell:
Let's get to Grant's unbelievable story. So many takeaways from this interview and then from his book. Again, can't believe he actually did this. Here we go.

Bobbi Rebell:
Grant Sabatier, you are a financial grownup. Welcome to the podcast.

Grant Sabatier:
Hey, glad to be here.

Bobbi Rebell:
And congratulations. You book, Financial Freedom, a Proven Path to All the Money You Will Ever Need is about to be a huge best seller. We were just talking offline about all the big plans you have, including your trailer just came out. I just watched it. So cool. Congrats on all.

Grant Sabatier:
Yeah, thanks. I appreciate it. It's been a long time coming. It's like a two year plus project and I'm just super excited to have it released worldwide and hear and get the feedback and help as many people as I can.

Bobbi Rebell:
So this is the latest step on a journey you've been on since going from having I think what $2.26 to your name, something like that, to having $1.25 million. You skyrocketed to fame with your Millennial Money website.

Grant Sabatier:
I feel, even though I'm only 33, I feel like I'm kind of in the bonus years of my life in a lot of ways and it's super cool and I'm grateful for it.

Bobbi Rebell:
Well, I hope every year feels like a bonus year for you. This has been a big year. I want to talk and you agreed to share his story about a controversial decision that you recently made that sounds contradictory to a lot of the things that people in the FIRE movement, which is financial independence, retire early, which you're part of advocate. You moved to New York City. My home. So welcome by the way.

Grant Sabatier:
Thank you.

Bobbi Rebell:
Not the most bargain place to be building up your financial nest egg Grant. What's going on? Tell us your money story.

Grant Sabatier:
Yeah, that's a great question. I've gotten that a lot recently. You're right. Compared to Chicago where I was living, where I became financially independent, New York City has about a 2.35X cost of living multiple, meaning things are about 2.35 times as expensive here than in Chicago. So based on that, you would expect to need at least double the amount of money.

Grant Sabatier:
But those are just statistics and one of the things that, I did quite a bit of preparation before I moved to New York City to get a sense for obviously what apartments cost and what food costs. And one of the things that I pretty quickly realized was you can make whatever life you want in New York City. Even though writ large, it's incredibly expensive. It's incredibly expensive to buy real estate here. It often doesn't make sense to buy real estate if you're going to be here for less than six or seven years.

Grant Sabatier:
But from a rental perspective, there's actually an incredible amount of affordable rentals that I was able to find. Food is actually categorically less expensive than in Chicago.

Bobbi Rebell:
Really?

Grant Sabatier:
Yeah. Good example, I'm a huge raspberry fan. I eat them every morning. I love them. It's just something that I know the price of. And in Chicago it was about $4 for just a little bunch of raspberries. And a block and a half from my apartment in New York City. I'm able to get them for $1.50.

Bobbi Rebell:
So wait, tell me, let me stop you here. So why did you move to, a lot of people might be surprised because to achieve financial freedom, a lot of people, including you, talk about yeah, watch the little things, but really watch the big things. Like housing, like your food bill, the big things. And yet you upsized the biggest thing to some degree. People often move to less expensive locations, at least while they're building up their nest egg, which I understand you already did.

Bobbi Rebell:
Tell us about the decision to move to a more expensive city, or more expensive in most ways. Why and what it's been like.

Grant Sabatier:
So actually, ironically, I've been in New York City six months and I spent, I think it's 17, I keep track of all this stuff about 17 to 20 percent less than the previous six months that I lived in Chicago. So it's actually been less expensive to live in New York City. My rent here is less than the mortgage payment that I was paying on my apartment.

Grant Sabatier:
I moved to New York City because I lived in Chicago for pretty much all of the last 14 years. I went to college in Chicago and was more than ready for a change. I always wanted to live in New York City. I grew up on the east coast. I wanted to come back. I don't know if I'm going to be a New York City lifer, but because the book's coming out, the proximity to media, I'm a huge fan of the Catskills and the Hudson River Valley. I think they're incredibly beautiful. I'd visited them a few times. And in fact I spend quite a bit of time there now.

Grant Sabatier:
And so for me, obviously housing, transportation and food, that's where the average American spends 70% or more of their income. And if you can control those three expense categories, then you can really kind of win the game. And so the most important thing with my move was affordable housing.

Grant Sabatier:
It's important to mention that I'm already financially independent. And so I became financially independent in 2015 and so I've had a pretty solid market since then. My investments have done well. So now I have more than enough money, so I'm able to hedge in that way. I think it certainly would be more difficult if I had started my financial independence journey in New York City. I had a lot of advantages to doing it in Chicago, which is writ large, more affordable. But because I'm already financially independent, I have more advantages.

Grant Sabatier:
But with that being said, the past few years, I never spend with my wife more than $50,000 a year. I'm on pace based on the way I've set up my life to probably spend in the $45,000, $48,000 range in 2019 in New York City.

Bobbi Rebell:
You mentioned that people have questioned this decision, including me. Do you feel that you've had to kind of defend it as part of the FIRE movement?

Grant Sabatier:
Oh, definitely. I think there's a little bit of a judgment inherent in some of the community and to me FIRE, it can really mean whatever you want it to mean and that's the beautiful thing about it. It's what kind of life do you want to live is the most important question. And then the second question is okay, how much money do you need to live that life?

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

Grant Sabatier:
I think the lesson is that you have so much more control. I mean, money really only matters if it helps you live a life that you love. I think that that idea is so central to money. And if you're not happy with your life, if you're stressed out and you're paying too much rent, you have the ability to move to a different neighborhood, get a roommate for a while to downsize.

Grant Sabatier:
I mean, when I was becoming financially independent in Chicago, I moved from a $1,500 a month apartment to an $800 a month apartment and yes, it was smaller. Yes it was crappier. But I was able to sleep better at night because I knew I was investing that money.

Bobbi Rebell:
Let's to your everyday money tip and this could apply to small items or to big decisions. And one thing I liked in your book, as you do a lot of math and you have a special way of calculating purchases or things you're considering buying that can really illustrate the impact of different choices. Go for it.

Grant Sabatier:
Yeah. So in the book, in one of the chapters, Is it Worth it, I outline 11 questions that you can ask yourself. If you go to financialfreedom book.com, you can download these 11 questions, keep them on your phone. You can print them out. And the questions are built around helping you figure out is it worth buying. And some of the trade offs that are in the book that you can calculate are how much of your life did you trade for this purchase? And one of those things, we can go to a car example, a $40,000 car if you're making $20 per hour after you factor in taxes and commuting time, it's gonna take you 2000 hours, an entire year of your life to afford that car. And on the flip side, you also lose the potential of that $40,000 to grow, which is even more profound.

Grant Sabatier:
And one of the things that I found, because I was interested in buying a $40,000 car, is that I would actually have to work almost six years longer in the future in order to afford that car because of the lost opportunity of not investing that money.

Grant Sabatier:
The best way to save money is just not to spend it because there's kind of, I call it the net effective spending, where whenever you buy anything, not only are you trading the time that you spent to make that money, but you're also trading the ability for that money to grow and the freedom that it buys you in the future. And that's kind of a mindset shift because I actually figured out that every $100 that I would spend, you know you go out to a nice meal and have a couple of drinks with your partner or with a friend and you know, say you spend $100. I figured out that I'd actually have to work four more days in the future in order to afford $100 purchase.

Grant Sabatier:
And so every time I spent $100, I was sacrificing for days of future freedom. And I literally went around and I have a calculator that I built called the Financial Freedom Calculator at financialfreedombook.com where you can put in all your own numbers and it'll tell you whether it's a $5 cup of coffee or a $40,000 car. It'll tell you in your own life how much freedom, how much time you're actually trading for that purchase.

Bobbi Rebell:
One are the things that I love about your book is all of the tools that it has and the different links. So it's kind of like the book will live on beyond the printed book, although some people will listen to it and read it on electronic books. But I love those tools because it makes it very granular and very specific and user friendly. Tell us a little bit more about the book and where people can find more about you and all your social channels grant. We love to follow you.

Grant Sabatier:
Yeah, so financialfreedombook.com is the best place to learn about the book. On the book website you can learn all about the book. You can also use all the tools and the book for free before you even buy the book. So there are nine calculators on there. They all work on your phone. I already have people who've read the book and they've bookmarked them and they're going into the store and they're using the calculators, which is super cool. So financialfreedombook.com. It's available wherever books are sold. Barnes and Noble, Amazon, your favorite local book seller. So I guess just go check it out. It's a bright blue cover with a bird on the front.

Grant Sabatier:
Social channels, you should check out the book Instagram account that I just launched. You can follow me around the world. I'm going to be visiting 40 different cities this spring and 17 countries in the fall so @financialfreedom on Instagram. And then hit me up, millennialmoney.com is my website. At millennialmoney on Twitter, those are the best ways to reach me.

Bobbi Rebell:
Love it. And I also love your new book trailer. We're going to leave a link to that in the show notes as well. So thank you Grant.

Grant Sabatier:
Thank you Bobbi. This is a lot of fun.

Bobbi Rebell:
Hey everyone, so glad we were able to talk about those calculators. They are a good thing in this case.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial grownup tip number one. I'm not always a huge fan of big budgets and counting up every dollar that you spend because it can feel so restrictive and you feel deprived. Almost like being on a diet. It is kind of like being on a money diet. And no one's going to feel good about that. And when you feel bad, at a certain point you're going to reach your breaking point and that's going to be the edge. You're going to fall off the bandwagon just like you do with the food diet. And hopefully as we get through January, we won't be falling off the bandwagon with all of our goals. We're all working on it.

Bobbi Rebell:
Anyway, taking the time however, to use a calculator like the ones that grant has put together to figure out the relationship between your purchases and their true cost and your life can totally change your mindset. I remember when Starbucks started putting calorie counts on the food in that counter, all those yummy cookies and goodies and stuff. So I love this yellow icing lemon cake. They have it there still in many of these Starbucks. I'm still obsessed with them as you can tell, but I don't really get them anymore because even though I always knew they were high calorie, I didn't really see the number. It didn't really register with me.

Bobbi Rebell:
And then they put the calories there. It's over 400 calories for this little slice of cake, which is not going to fill you up. And that visual, that number, calculating the percentage of that, of the number of calories that I'm supposed to eat per day and knowing what a high percentage was going to go to something that really didn't give me that much bang for my calorie buck really motivated me to change my behavior. I'm far from perfect when it comes to choosing the snacks, but I am more likely now to go for a protein box where it may not have the absolute lowest calories, but I know at least I'm going to get some nutrition for my choice.

Bobbi Rebell:
I think it's the same way when it comes to money. When you really calculate the true cost as Grant points out, it helps.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial grownup tip number Twitter, do not get caught up in labels and trends to the point where you don't do what you want to do. Grant is managing New York City on his own terms, but he's honest. There are places that he could live where he would reach his financial goals faster and without having to watch his finances as tightly, but he is putting his life first.

Bobbi Rebell:
Never live your life backwards or for someone else's idea of what they think you should be doing.

Bobbi Rebell:
Big thanks to you Grant. So happy for all he has achieved including his first book, Financial Freedom, a Proven Path to All the Money You Will Ever Need. Go order it now. As an author, guys, I have to stress buying it on preorder really makes a difference at hitting the bestseller lists and all that comes with it. So if you like Grant and you think you're going to like the book, go right now and preorder it so you get it right when it comes out and you also help Grant a little bit in the process as they say.

Bobbi Rebell:
We're going to have a link for it in the show notes as well, and also meaningful you. Be in touch. BobbiRebell1 on Instagram, BobbiRebell on Twitter and our email address is hello@financialgrownup.com.

Bobbi Rebell:
Big thanks to Grant Sabatier for 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.

Taxes are never fun but millions of Americans may pay less for 2018. David Rae CFP® joins Bobbi for a breakdown of what changes matter and specific things Financial Grownups can do to make sure they are on track for when it is time to turn in their returns this spring. 

Here are 5 tips for year end tax planning

• Max out your retirement accounts

• Set up the Right Retirement Plan for your business

• Strategically Bunch your Tax Deductions

• Consider Doner-Advised Funds

• Tax-Loss Harvesting

Technology can’t really be unplugged, so the best solution is the make it work for us as Humans. Back to Human author Dan Schawbel joins Bobbi Rebell as co-host on this special Financial Grownup Guide. They discuss 5 specific actionable tips to using technology to enhance and humanize the role of our devices in our daily lives. 

• Specific ways to eliminate tech driven distractions

• How to manage devices and stay focused in meetings

• How to use apps to learn and then control your time online.

• How to most effectively use video conferencing

• The best ways to delegate unwanted tasks to technology so you can focus on being more human

Episode Links:

Dan's book Back to Human

Dan's book Promote Yourself and Me 2.0

Dan’s podcast 5 Questions with Dan Schawbel

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

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial Grownup Guide, five ways to make technology more human, with special guest cohost, Back to Human author, Dan Schawbel.

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 gonna 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:
Hi everyone, welcome to a new Financial Grownup Guide. These are short episodes meant to give us all some actionable life tips to be a little bit more grownup. If you are looking for what we now call classic episodes with money stories and everyday money tips from high achievers, they drop on Mondays and Thursdays. We have a library of over 100 and growing. So do check them out.

Bobbi Rebell:
Let's talk about technology. So many of us are feeling tech overload these days. At first, I had the idea to do a list of tips for unplugging. But you know what? I'm not sure if that's the best thing, or ever realistic. What we really need to do is just make technology work for us. So I recruited Dan Schawbel, he literally wrote a book about this called Back to Human, to get some tips about how we can get our technology to help us be a little more human.

Bobbi Rebell:
Hey Dan Schawbel, thanks for co-hosting this special episode with me.

Dan Schawbel:
So happy to be here with you.

Bobbi Rebell:
This is the thing Dan, we need to learn to make tech more human in the new year because we cannot get rid of technology. We're over that whole concept. But yet we have to make it work for us as humans because of course you are the author of Back to Human. So you're here to guide us. So thanks for joining me.

Dan Schawbel:
Happy to be here as your cohost.

Bobbi Rebell:
Tell us more about why this topic is so important to you, you basically wrote ... that's a lot of what the book Back to Human is.

Dan Schawbel:
Yeah. Technology has created the illusion of connection when in reality, our overuse and misuse of it has created a sense of isolation, loneliness, disengagement and lower team and organizational commitment. The way the workplace has changed now versus years ago is more people working remote, a third of the global workforce does. Yet 2/3 are disengaged. And you can be isolated in a physical space whether it's a corporate office. You can be isolated in the subway in New York City, where we both live, you can be isolated while you're walking down the street because people are looking and spending more time on devices than they are looking at a human being. And so I think this is important because as an introvert, as someone whose built a lot of connections digitally, I realize that it was very isolating and that the best way to use technology is to use it as a bridge to human connection. Let it get you to physical spaces, but be attentive, be respectful, and focus on the human to human communication because those relationships are what are gonna matter for you for the rest of your life.

Bobbi Rebell:
But also, I love that you're also realistic, that we can't completely unplug. It is what it is.

Dan Schawbel:
It is what it is. I think it's how, when, and where you use it. I interviewed 100 top young leaders and they say technology is a double-edged sword. It can be good or bad. And I think texting's someone that there's a meeting in five minutes or 10 minutes is appropriate but if you're in an argument with your coworker that's not gonna be solved through text and it's actually gonna make it worse.

Bobbi Rebell:
Alright. So Dan you brought with you five ways that we can make tech more human. Number one, eliminate distractions in your workplace, technology distractions.

Dan Schawbel:
Yeah. By watching TV, by having your iPad out, by looking at a laptop, if you're always doing that all day you're gonna feel trapped, you're gonna feel isolated from those around you. So be smart about what's in front of you and make sure that you take breaks because otherwise if you don't have a tech detox it's gonna be bad for your health and relationships.

Bobbi Rebell:
And I love that you pointed out take breaks because so many workspaces now have screens all around us, whether it's television, with programming and content going on, or screens that just have corporate messaging. We screens everywhere. Not to mention our own devices, our phone, our iPad, our computer. So you make a great point that we need to walk away a little.

Dan Schawbel:
Everyone needs a break. Especially in today's society, everyone's always on. Not having your phone is the new vacation, the average work week in America is 47 hours a week but people bring their devices home with them and on weekends. So we're just overworked, we're burned out and that's why there's a whole backlash now globally on hours work. Finland, UK they're fighting for four day work week. In France they have the right to disconnect. In Japan, every citizen gets Monday mornings off. So we're-

Bobbi Rebell:
Really?

Dan Schawbel:
The technology's made us always work and now all these countries are saying, hey we need to do something about this. This is bad for the population's health.

Bobbi Rebell:
And your second tip actually goes to that point because not only are the devices encroaching on our personal time, they're encroaching on our meeting time because you'll be in a meeting and people are sometimes sitting there kind of looking at you but also on their screens. Which is like why bother even having this meeting? So what's your second tip?

Dan Schawbel:
Put your devices in the middle of the table when you're in a meeting. People send an average of five texts within a meeting. And so they're not being respectful for the people who are speaking, they're unable to collaborate, and I think it's part of the reason why meetings are dysfunctional and they last too long because people are physically there but not mentally, emotionally there. And so they're unable to contribute, collaborate, and it's not only disrespectful but what's the point in even being in the meeting in the first place if you're texting and emailing people who aren't even at that meeting?

Bobbi Rebell:
Dan, number three, so apropo, because there's so many apps on our phones that are distracting us but we actually have some apps that can do some good.

Dan Schawbel:
Yeah. The best way to take stock of how you're spending your time using technology is to use Moment app or rescuetime.com and they'll help you better understand how you're spending your time on apps and websites. And if you see that you're spending too much time on a certain app or a website, it's an indicator that you might wanna reallocate that time to more personal communication.

Bobbi Rebell:
And one way to be a little more personal in your communication, but also use technology, and this is number four, you wanna talk to us about video conferencing, because you can get a lot more from that. It's not the same as in person but it's a step in the right direction, right?

Dan Schawbel:
That's one of the great inventions of the past few decades is video conferencing because most communication is nonverbal and video conferencing allows you to not just hear someone but actually see them and how they express their emotions. And as a result you feel like you have a stronger relationship with them and you can better understand the message they're trying to get across.

Bobbi Rebell:
I think my favorite of your five tips is this one, the final one, which has to to do with using technology for the things that you can really outsource and technology is better at.

Dan Schawbel:
Let technology remove the work that you don't even wanna do. All that routine work, like making sure that you and your coworker or friend are going to the same event or birthday party, conference room at the same time so that you can be more thoughtful about the time you're spending with them when you're at that event, when you're in the conference room or celebrating someone's birthday party. And so I think that calendars and chat box and some of these newer technologies can remove the logistical work from what you have to do on a daily basis so you can spend more time doing the face to face.

Bobbi Rebell:
All good tips. Thank you so much Dan. And the final tip, of course, is to read your book, Back to Human because it has so many more incredibly ways to optimize the way that you interact with technology so it's actually supporting your life goals and making your life better and not having all of these negative effects that so many of us are fighting back against. So thank you Dan.

Dan Schawbel:
Thank you.

Bobbi Rebell:
Thanks everyone for joining us. Make sure to subscribe so you don't miss anymore upcoming Financial Grownup Guides. I am very excited about some of the ones that we have planned and be in touch on Instagram at BobbiRebell1 on twitter at BobbiRebell, and of course you can always email us, we are at hello@financialgrownup.com so glad you joined us in investing in getting a little bit closer to being financial grownups.

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

Entrepreneur Melissa Clark had a lot going on- too much. Even she was confused. She was a wellness practitioner, creating content on many platforms including local tv, podcasting, video and books, including a children’s book, as well as coaching and speaking businesses focused on women’s empowerment. But letting go and narrower her focus was a challenge. 

In Melissa’s money story you will learn:

-How Melissa started a business based on her passion for Reiki and wellness

-How the business was evolving in unexpected ways

-The difficult choice she had to make to pare back parts of the business in order to build up the ones that were resonating with her audience

In Melissa’s money lesson you will learn:

-How Melissa prioritized her business growth

-The criteria she used to focus her energy on certain parts of her business

-How she got it all done while working a full-time job!!

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

-How to self-publish a book for free or without upfront costs

-The things you might want to pay for

-Specifically how Melissa used Create Space

-The advantages of print on demand, especially for special occasions

-Whether you should consider producing an audio guide

-How digital guides can be a great option to save costs

Bobbi and Melissa also talk about

-The She Shift brand and her book

-Melissa’s new partnerships with women’s organizations

-Melissa’s speaking business and her podcast

In My Take you will learn:

-How to pivot your business to focus on the areas that are resonating with your audience

-They key sign it doesn’t make sense to other people- is when they tell you they are confused

-The importance of consistency in brand building

-The difference between procrastinating and taking the right amount of time for a project aka not putting something out there before it is ready. 

Episode Links

Learn More about The She Shift TheSheShift.com

Follow Melissa and the She Shift!

Facebook TheSheShift

Twitter @thesheshift

Instagram @thesheshift

LinkedIn :Melissa Clark

Create Space

 

Entrepreneur Melissa Clark had a lot going on- too much. In this Financial Grownup podcast episode we discuss how Melissa prioritized her business growth and the criteria she used to focus her energy on certain parts of her business. #Rebranding #FinancialGrownup #RebrandSmallBusiness #Author

---

Transcription

Melissa Clark:
Reiki was something that really helped me in my own life, so I was very passionate about helping other people. It was growing slowly. Trying to figure out how to tie everything in together, that was actually a little bit of a challenge because people knew that I was doing all of these things, but they weren't related so much.

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, this is an episode that makes me really proud of our guest. She is Melissa Clark, and her relatively new brand is The She Shift. More on that in a sec. Not long ago, Melissa thought she was building a wellness business as a Reiki practitioner under the brand The Wholistic Package. The brand clarity was an issue because she had so much going on. She had a children's book, she was working as a speaker, she was hosting a local TV show, she had a line of inspirational apparel, and a book on women and ambition, and videos, and lots of content. So much content. And this was also, by the way, her side hustle.

Bobbi Rebell:
Before we get to her story, quick welcome to our newest listeners and welcome back to our regulars. We are all busy, so we try to keep the podcast here to what we call flex time. The episodes are around fifteen minutes, but if you have a little more time, stack them together, binge, whatever you want to call it. It is about making it work for you. Make sure to subscribe, and you will get three a week. Go into settings and just confirm that you are on auto-download so you don't miss any, and if you still have a second, take a screenshot of the episode on your phone if that's where you're listening to it, and please share it on your social media channels. Help us to spread the word.

Bobbi Rebell:
Okay, let's get to Melissa Clark. Brave interview here because Melissa basically admits after I kind of confront her that yes, she had a bunch of different product lines and content going on that she could sort of justify as related, but her audience, well, a lot of the time, they were confused, I was confused, but she's got it together now. So this is a story of how she dropped what wasn't working and built up what was, and no, it did not happen overnight. This lady works a lot. Here is The She Shift's Melissa Clark.

Bobbi Rebell:
Hey, Melissa Clark, you're a financial grownup, welcome to the podcast.

Melissa Clark:
Hi, Bobbi. Thanks so much for having me.

Bobbi Rebell:
Congratulations on the continued growth of your relatively new platform. We're going to talk about that. She Shift, which is not only a website, a blog, it's also a book, it's also a podcast, and it is growing. You're also a speaker. And it's all about empowering women.

Melissa Clark:
Yes, very much so. And I'm very excited to have launched that last year and all of the amazing things, as you said, under that umbrella.

Bobbi Rebell:
And it's not just a launch of that, it was actually a shift in and of itself. It was a rebrand. You made some tough decisions and had to let some things go. Tell us your money story about this rebrand and pivoting of what you were doing in your whole business

Melissa Clark:
A few years ago, I started as a wellness practitioner, a Reiki practitioner, and my business at the time was called The Wholistic Package, and in that time, I was working on wellness, I was also in the writing process. Things were shifting for myself during the past few years, and so far as working more with women through a local television show that I had in my community, through a line of inspirational apparel that I was working on, and then my book came about, and I really decided at one point that it was the right time to shift everything for myself and shift everything under one umbrella and under one brand, because for me, it really made sense to have everything under one brand that focused on women and women empowerment, and each item that I have, or service that I have, is something different, but everything has the same mission.

Melissa Clark:
I really had to almost start from scratch and create content and figure out how to change my platform, my website, my logo. So everything under The She Shift, I essentially had to start over and start from scratch and create. I basically put my head down for ten months and worked on my book and worked on my consulting packages and worked on all of the content that was going to be under that brand, and I had to figure out really what direction and where I saw that in the bigger picture. So in 2016, I started to transition with the book, and it was actually October of last year where I focused more on that specific content, and about six weeks ago, I launched every piece of content and every facet and aspect of The She Shift.

Bobbi Rebell:
Was it hard, or what did it feel like to let go of your old platform?

Melissa Clark:
As a wellness practitioner, that was something ... Reiki was something that really helped me in my own life, so I was very passionate about helping other people. It was growing slowly, but all of the other things I was working on, I published a children's book in 2015, and I was working on the inspirational apparel that I have for women. So I was kind of doing all of these different things and trying to figure out how to tie everything in together. That was actually a little bit of a challenge because people knew that I was doing all of these things, but they weren't related so much. So they were ... I was trying to make everything about our mind, body, and spirit, and improving ourselves and our well-being. But, you know, everything had a little bit of a different theme, so-

Bobbi Rebell:
It almost sounds like it was confusing to your audience.

Melissa Clark:
At points, I did get some feedback that people knew the separate pieces of what I was doing, but sometimes, they weren't quite sure either. So it was a time when I had to reevaluate what I was working on and how I could get all of these things under one umbrella because I was so passionate about working on the consulting side, and the speaking side, and my writing, and doing all of these things, but I realized at the end of the day that everything had the same message and it was the same mission, so I could then put it under the same. So it did take a little bit for me to let go of the other side of it.

Bobbi Rebell:
Were you running multiple social media accounts for each of these brands at the time?

Melissa Clark:
I was working on The Wholistic Package, and I then switched over. I actually had to create a brand new Facebook account. At the time, I had several hundred followers through my old business, but because I had to change the mission of the business, I had to start a new account with that, and then I ended up starting at that time, I went into the Instagram, and the Twitter, and the LinkedIn, and that's when I really started creating more content and trying to be more consistent with the social media. I've been working with the content a lot more these days because there's so much content to work with, and I do everything from videos to my podcast to different writing pieces, and I really try to keep up on all of that, but everything is under the same mission and theme now, so now I have a lot of content to work with.

Bobbi Rebell:
So what is the lesson for our listeners from your story? I mean, it's hard to say goodbye to a brand that you created, that you put so much into. So much of your love, and so much money, time, and resources.

Melissa Clark:
Sure, so shedding that piece, which seemed to be maybe a little difficult at the time, it really brought me to where I am today, and I organically followed my path I say, because I know that this is where I'm meant to be and what I'm meant to be doing, so the lesson is sometimes you may be working on something at one point in your life, and that could change. I mean, even in the business that I have now, you never know. I always say I do think about where it's going to be five years from now, but I do take everything day by day because you really don't know where things are going to go or what opportunities are going to present themselves in your life.

Bobbi Rebell:
For your everyday money tip, you are a self-published author. This is a world I don't know that much about, but you have some brilliant advice for people that don't want to have to front any money. I didn't know this. You can pretty much at least publish, obviously there's things coming up to publishing, but you can publish almost for free, especially, this is great, not only for people that want to publish for professional reasons, but maybe you just want to publish a few for a family member, for a special occasion, for a friend's wedding, make a little mini-book or something. Tell us.

Melissa Clark:
Sure. So with my personal experience for my children's book and for my book for women in business, I've used Create Space, which I started with Create Space in 2015 is when my children's book came out. So at that time, I wrote the printed book and I had a Kindle version. And for my book for women in business, "The She Shift", I have it in a paperback, and what I love about self-publishing is that you go onto their website, you can either do it yourself or you can work with a designer and have them upload the file, and it's print on demand. So really, if you don't want to spend a lot of money for a large quantity of books up front, and let's say you plan on doing an event, a table event, or you want to buy some copies for your family, you can go in and you can select how many you'd like, and it's a print on demand. So there's not a lot of up front coasts regarding the printing of the book, and it really, I think, helps a lot of authors to save some costs in that way.

Bobbi Rebell:
And also, you said you could do audio and Kindle as well, or electronic, it doesn't have to be Kindle.

Melissa Clark:
Sure, so you can do an ebook, and also now, a lot of authors are doing audio guides on Audible or through different platforms. My own audio guides, I actually recorded them myself and they're on my website. So you can do either, which that also can save costs because it's a digital file, so they're really becoming popular as well now, especially the audio guides, so it's another way for authors to save a little bit on the printing and designing costs.

Bobbi Rebell:
I love that. All right, let's talk about The She Shift a little bit more. You mentioned you don't know where it will be in five years. Let's talk about the next five months, the rest of 2018. What's on the agenda?

Melissa Clark:
Thank you. So right now, I'm focusing on my book launch, which is on Amazon, and then consulting, speaking, and other opportunities, and I have some speaking engagements scheduled, and I'm also partnering with some women's organizations, so I'm continuing to do those things, and I really look forward to the next six months to really seeing what's going to happen and connecting with more amazing women.

Bobbi Rebell:
All right, where can everyone find out more about you and The She Shift?

Melissa Clark:
Sure. TheSheShift.com, or I'm on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter, and Instagram. LinkedIn, I'm under Melissa Clark, and the others, it's under The She Shift.

Bobbi Rebell:
Melissa, this was wonderful. Thank you so much.

Melissa Clark:
Thank you so much, Bobbi.

Bobbi Rebell:
Hey everyone, here's my take on Melissa's story. Financial grownup tip number one, your business has to make sense to other people. If you have to constantly explain how the parts fit together, they don't. And it's okay to drop products that used to work with your brand, but no longer do. It's also okay to drop a brand completely, as Melissa basically did with The Wholistic Package. And it was hard. She had put a lot into it and she loved it. But to focus on her She Shift business, she had to make some hard choices. Saying goodbye to something so much went into to make time in your day and in your mind to build up something that's better ultimately is hard, but worth it.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial grownup tip number two, take the time. Melissa talked about this revamp going back a couple of years. A lot of that was that her day job took up a lot of her time. That's okay. So she was realistic about what it would take to get this done. Doing something methodically and carefully is not the same as procrastinating, and during that time, she was building up different parts of it to be a more cohesive brand. Being deliberate in your plans and how you allocate resources is a very financial grownup thing to do.

Bobbi Rebell:
Thanks to all of you for supporting the show. I want to hear about your grownup money and business experiences. I love hearing from you and getting all kinds of feedback. On Instagram, I am @BobbiRebell1, on Twitter @BobbiRebell, and on Facebook at BobbiRebell. For the show notes, go to BobbiRebell.com/podcast/MelissaClark, and all of the show notes follow the same pattern in that the last segment is just the guest's name. So we keep it really simple, you don't have to worry about what number it was, just know the guest's name and it's BobbiRebell.com/podcast/the guest's name. And while you're there, sign up for our new [inaudible 00:13:59], we're going to get it going again this fall. Looking forward to some great content there.

Bobbi Rebell:
Thank you to Melissa Clark for your candor and for such a real discussion about the challenges of being an entrepreneur, and just being a grownup, figuring out who you are and what works, and for helping all of us get one step closer to being financial grownups.

Startup guru Courtney Reum credits family dinners and the lessons served with helping to create the foundation of his business success. Along with his brother, he has not only built and sold his own venture (Veev) and written a best seller “Shortcut Your Startup”, but is now also mentoring and supporting a new generation of entrepreneurs and brands. 

 

In Courtney’s money  story you will learn:

-The importance of family dinners in forming Courtney’s values

-The financial values Courtney and his brother learned from their parents

-Courtney’s confession about his teenage self

-How it helped Courtney learn about financial priorities and resource allocation

-Why Courtney references Jane Fonda and Jazzercise when talking about nutrition

-Courtney’s love of Sushi on Sundays

In Courtney’s money lesson you will learn:

-How his parents shared meals in order to stretch their dinners out budget

-The one key thing Courtney’s dad did when the bill came that can save you money

-Advice on how to figure out the right amount to tip when eating out

-The importance of sticking to old fashioned values even though technology dominates

-Little known facts about how phone numbers were created

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

-Courtney’s advice about carrying cash in a digital world

-Why $100 is the magic number for his emergency stash when traveling

Bobbi and Courtney also talk about

-How M13 began after the brothers sold Veev

-Why Courtney believes we are living in the golden age of creating brands

-Courtney’s angel investments and his take on consumer tech brands

-Why he believes all brands need to be media and tech companies

-What the M13 playbook is and how it works

-Courtney’s book with his brother, “Shortcut your Startup” 

-The importance of realizing “Time is the new Money"

In My Take you will learn

-How eating together as a family has been shown to increase the odds of success for kids

-Why checking the bill at restaurants often leads to corrections- in your favor

EPISODE LINKS:

Follow Courtney!!

Instagram @CourtneyReum And his insta with his brother Carter @ReumBrothers

Twitter @courtneyreum @M13company

Linkedin Courtney Reum

 

Learn more about M13 at m13.co

 

Read Courtney’s book “Shortcut your Startup” !

 

Learn more about the spirits brand they built and sold: Veev !

 

Learn more about the companies Courtney and M13.co are working with:

Classpass

Lyft

Casper

Kevita

Pinterest

Bonobos

Warby Parker

 

Learn more about the success that comes from eating together as a family:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2015/01/12/the-most-important-thing-you-can-do-with-your-kids-eat-dinner-with-them/?utm_term=.94cf3514f57c

 

---

Transcription

Courtney Reum:
They certainly tried to show us and explain that there's some nutrition here. Back then it was like I call the Jane Fonda Jazzercise, so it was they were like, "This is not too much fat, not too much calories. It's good, heres why," and so I equate the not too much fat, not too many calories to just the value of the meal, and so they were all about the value in things.

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 Financial Grownup friends, that was Courtney Reum talking about family dinners growing up, and this is on family. They eat together generally seven nights a week, and while, as you will hear in his story, it wasn't about the food, the food did provide a largely unspoken lesson about money allocation and priorities. I'm really excited to share this story, I think we're all going to find something that we can relate to here and put to work in our own lives.

Bobbi Rebell:
All right, first a quick welcome. We keep things short here, around 15 minutes. Flex time for our busy listeners because you can listen to one episode or you can listen to a few if you have more time. Make sure to subscribe if you haven't done so already, so you won't miss any upcoming episodes, and make sure when you do so, to go into settings and set you the auto-download. That way you never have to think about it again. If you have a free moment after that, leave a review. We see every one of them, we really appreciate it, and it is the best way for other people to hear about the show and for us to grow. Speaking of that, of course you can also tell a friend.

Bobbi Rebell:
All right, let's get to Courtney. There is something in this episode for everyone. Courtney Reum is not as famous as he should be, or as he will be. Pay attention to this guy, and his brother by the way, who's also his business partner, Carter. After stints at Goldman Sachs and success creating and then selling their popular spirits company, VeeV, the brothers are now helping nurture other success stories with their company M13. It's a disruptive brand development studio and venture capital firm. Their portfolio incudes investments in some names you may or may not have heard of, like Lyft, ClassPass, Pinterest, Bonobos, Warby Parker and more.

Bobbi Rebell:
By the way, in their spare time, they wrote a book for anyone who wants to rev up their brand, Shortcut Your Startup. Courtney also drops some random facts I never knew, and I bet you didn't either, so play close attention, here is Courtney Reum.

Bobbi Rebell:
Courtney Reum, you're a financial grownup, welcome to the podcast.

Courtney Reum:
Thanks so much for having me. Great to be here.

Bobbi Rebell:
I'm so excited to have you. Not only are you, and your brother I should say, the inventors of Veev, which a lot of people are fans of, you now have a new company which we'll talk more extensively about after your money story, but M13, which is a brand development company, you have investments in a lot of really cool companies, from ClassPass, to Casper, to Lyft. Tell us just briefly about it. What is M13? M13 has a really cool origin, the name right?

Courtney Reum:
Yeah. Well we wanted to have that mysterious MI6 kind of I don't know what they do, but it must be something cool sound to it. But the literal name, M13, is the brightest cluster of starts in the galaxy, whereby the sum of the whole shines greater than the individual parts. It's this idea of connecting the dots and pitting the pieces together, which is what we're really endeavoring to with M13.

Bobbi Rebell:
Cool. I should mention you also have a book.

Courtney Reum:
We do. What we're trying to do right now with M13 is build a company for building companies, so we're starting some of our own, we're working with other companies, and so we have a, I guess I'd call it a venture capital arm and then a brand development studio, and we're really trying to institutionalize the platform or the machinery of how you create brands. We decided to try to codify that and write a book called Shortcut Your Startup, that is a lot of the principals and things we're doing, because we believe it's the new age of creating consumer brands and things like that, so we wanted to share what we've learned and then hopefully continue to improve on it with what we're doing with M13.

Bobbi Rebell:
Love that. You also learned a lot from your parents growing up. I know your father unfortunately passed away a little more than a year ago, but there were a lot of lessons around the dinner table, about saving and splurging. Tell us your money story Courtney.

Courtney Reum:
I think one of my most vivid memories growing up is that my family was really big on the lost art of having family dinner, probably almost until the time we got to high school, we probably did it seven days a week just about, and even through high school, probably four or five, which I think is almost unheard of. But what stands out to me is my parents, who were very frugal even when they didn't have to be, but always very value oriented, we would probably, four nights a week, eat some kind of Stouffer's, Lean Cuisine, AKA TV dinner. The only real choice for the night would be are we going to have spaghetti tonight or are we going to have chicken and vegetables? Whatever it may be.

Bobbi Rebell:
Right. But your mom wasn't cooking spaghetti from scratch, these were heat-up meals for $5, $10, whatever they were going for at that time.

Courtney Reum:
Right, because I remember being teenager, and I was always a little bit of a smart you know what, and my mom would say, "Okay, I'm going to cook dinner," I'm like, "You call that cooking?" She's like, "You know what I mean, just pick which one you want." I think my family's a bunch of type A busy bees, people on the go, but we would have TV dinners three or four nights a weeks, and then Sunday would always be the day where my parents would say, "All right, we're going to go out for a nice dinner. Where do you guys want to go?" Nine out of 10 times, growing up in Chicago in the 90s we'll say, it would be sushi, and despite what people may think now, sushi was super exotic.

Bobbi Rebell:
Oh yeah.

Courtney Reum:
And rare back then, to the point that not one friend of mine ate sushi. My friends in high school, like on the football team and stuff, when I would walk somewhere with a cut roll of sushi, they would take it out and throw it back and forth like it was an egg toss because they were so wowed by what the heck sushi was. Anyways-

Bobbi Rebell:
And it was expensive.

Courtney Reum:
Yeah, and it was expensive. We certainly grew up having every opportunity, but having said that, I could not have gone out for sushi four nights a week, so it was a great lesson in all right, I'm going to have a TV dinner tonight, not realizing how some of those nitrates and processing and all that good stuff.

Bobbi Rebell:
It was a different time. Give your parents a break. We didn't know at the time. Now we're all eating clean.

Courtney Reum:
Yes, exactly, but I definitely was able to scoff down a few of those dinners, knowing that Sunday was around the corner and we were going to have our favorite sushi dinners.

Bobbi Rebell:
Did your parents ever talk to you about the financial decisions behind that?

Courtney Reum:
My parents didn't explicitly talk about it, but they certainly tried to show us and explain that, "Hey, we don't have time, nor can we go out for sushi every night, but this is still a really good meal. There's some nutrition here." Back then it was like I call the Jane Fonda Jazzercise, so it was they were like, "This is not too much fat, not too much calories. It's good, heres why," and so I equate the not too much fat, not too many calories to just the value of the meal, and so they were all about the value in things.

Bobbi Rebell:
For our listeners, what is the takeaway? How can people apply this lesson of saving and then splurging to their own lives?

Courtney Reum:
My parents are both highly disciplined people, and I would like to think that has trickled down to us. Even to keep it with food, since it's such a bonding occasion, my parents loved to tell stories of living in New York City right after they graduated college, and they would go out to dinner once a week because they felt like it was important to do right when they were newly weds, but they couldn't afford to really go out to dinner, so they would share one appetizer, one entree, one dessert and one coffee. The fact that they had the discipline to still find a way to enjoy and make the most of whatever they could do, but they had the discipline to realize we can't go out for a full-blown meal all the time, and that made a big impression on me.

Bobbi Rebell:
What's the most memorable financial lesson your dad taught you?

Courtney Reum:
My dad checked every bill from every restaurant. Whether we spent $7 or $70, he would check every bill. Still to this day, I do that, and I'm shocked how often there's a mistake on the bill, and most people, if you don't really check it closely, they don't catch it. They're like oh, they threw another drink on there, and maybe you don't care, but you might as well at least know. My dad would always joke, "It's funny how the restaurant very rarely makes an error in your favor." He just taught me to really dot your Ts and cross your Is, and my dad was one of those guys who could do incredible math in his head. None of this stuff where you just take the amount of the check and double it to do the tip or something like that, he would calculate whatever number was in his mind, 16%, 17%, without tax because he didn't believe you tipped on tax back then, and just do it in his head and write it down. Just having a facility with numbers and being in the details was something I really took from him.

Bobbi Rebell:
Right. He didn't have apps that would split things up and calculate everything for him.

Courtney Reum:
No calculators on his phone because there was and phones. He was like a human calculator, at least up to maybe two or three digits.

Bobbi Rebell:
For our listeners, what's the takeaway from that?

Courtney Reum:
I think there is that old fashioned way to do things, and we've got to make sure [inaudible 00:09:20] where we don't lose it in the world of talk to text or voice or you name it, because I always say to people, "Do you know why telephone numbers are seven digits, not including area code? Because seven digits is roughly the amount of digits that can stay in you short-term memory, depending on how you define that, 30 seconds to a minute, this can stay in your memory and you can remember it. Back in the day when phone numbers were created, you really needed to remember that thing, or even if you wrote to down, and so it was important that it stayed in your short-term memory." Now think how few numbers we actually know off the top of our head, so we have to make sure we just don't lose those skills.

Bobbi Rebell:
I love that. Speaking of skills, let's talk about your everyday money tip, because we were joking before we started taping, that you are ... I can't even keep track Courtney. I know you got off an overnight, but then it was delayed and you were on the tarmac. You travel a lot and you don't use a lot of cash, but cash is important in terms of this one everyday money tip that you're going to share.

Courtney Reum:
Yes. I always keep an emergency $100 bill, just for a rainy day, in my briefcase. My briefcase is more of a tech Tumi backpack, but I always keep it in there, try to always replenish it when I use it, and as silly as it sounds, obviously it takes up no room and there are so many times where I'm some place, I'm like, "I have no money," I'm like, "Wait. The emergency 100." I would encourage people, whether it's an emergency 20 or 50 or 100, whatever it is, always hide it from yourself so you don't use it too often, but then always have it available.

Bobbi Rebell:
Great advice, and something we all should definitely do. All right, let's talk a little bit more about M13. Where are you taking this company? Because this was basically formed after you sold Viiv, what's happening with it next and what should we look forward to hearing about?

Courtney Reum:
Yeah, as I alluded to, I think our whole thing when we sold Viiv, was we had started and operated some companies, we had been on the boards of a bunch of other companies and thankfully been successful. For example, there's a probiotic and kombucha line called KeVita, that Pepsi bought a couple of years ago. Basically, all consumer tech companies, we probably made, at that time, maybe three dozen angel investments, and we said, "You know," we tried to step back and do the proverbial lift your head up, see where the world's going, and we thought yeah, of course we could, we had plenty of ideas, we could start a new company, try to make it successful, sell it or not sell it.

Courtney Reum:
But we really think we're living in this golden age of creating brands, again, we focus on consumer tech brands, and by that I mean consumer brands that tend to be techable, so that can be anything like direct to consumer online brand, or even something like a Lyft that we're big investors in, or Pinterest.

Bobbi Rebell:
Right. Give us some more examples. Yeah, drop some names.

Courtney Reum:
Drop some names, okay. Let's see. Right now I'm wearing Bonobos pants, Warby Parker glasses, some of the mattress companies, so it's all things that we basically believe that every consumer brand needs to be saying to themselves, "How can it more of a media and tech company?" Because what's really changed is that this is the golden age of creating brands. I saw a funny meme the other day that was like I want to create a brand and someone says, "How should I do it?2 he goes, "Oh, it's really easy. You just get someone to give you a name, a logo, and then you make it in China and you sell some ads on Instagram." It obviously a joke, but there's some truth to it.

Courtney Reum:
What we're trying to do is institutionalize the process of brand building. Obviously nothing is one size fits all, but there are things that I get asked every single day like, "Hey, do you know a good digital marketing agency? Do you know someone who does that?" Rather than do the analog way of replying to every one of those, or thinking about who I know or who did I come across that week, we have actually taken all of our learnings and put it into what we call our M13 playbook, which is literally a digital repository of all our best practices and best resources. That's contacts, that distribution strategies, that's broker partners, those are relationships, and have actually put it in a format that we believe if we do this well, will help brands start faster, more time efficiently. Our book is all about time is the new money, so it's about trying to launch brands at scale so we can do it in a repeatable way and launch brands more quickly and more often than we previously would have been able to.

Bobbi Rebell:
Cool. Tell us more about where people can find out more about you and Shortcut Your Startup, which is your book, and all your social channels. I know you're a little bit shy about being too promotional on social, but people can at least see pictures of your adorable mom on your social right?

Courtney Reum:
Right, exactly. If nothing else, please read the first page of my book because it's dedicated to my dad, and please look at my social media to find my mom. My Instagram is really easy, it's just my first name and last, @courtneyreum. If you find another one of those, I would be shocked, so it should be easy to find me there. M13.co, not .com, .co because it's more trendy now.

Bobbi Rebell:
Oh, is it? Okay.

Courtney Reum:
Yes.

Bobbi Rebell:
I learn so much from you Courtney.

Courtney Reum:
Yeah. I don't do a ton with LinkedIn, but I think I've gotten about three or four requests since we've been sitting here, so that's the world we're living in, and our book, shortcutyourstartup.com, there's a website, and then of course, since the whole world is on Amazon Prime, you can certainly find us there too.

Bobbi Rebell:
Courtney, I'm so excited to see how much more you accomplish. You're so impressive. Congratulations on everything.

Courtney Reum:
Thank you so much for having me. It's been a lot of fun.

Bobbi Rebell:
Here's my take on Courtney's money story and what he had to say. Financial grownup tip number one. We focused primarily on the fact that Courtney's parents did spend a lot of time preparing or money on everyday meals, and left that to the once a week sushi splurge, but Courtney also said something very important, and that is that they ate together as a family pretty much every night. Research has shown that leads to high achievement in kids, specifically dinnertime conversation boosts vocabulary for young kids, and for school-age kids, regular mealtime is a powerful predictor of high achievement scores, more so than time spent in school, doing homework, playing sports and doing art.

Bobbi Rebell:
There's even more. Other research found that teenagers who ate family meals five to seven times a week were twice as likely to get As in school as those who ate two or fewer times a week with their families. Full disclosure here, I am aspiring to this, it is not happening yet, so I'm going to put that on my fall to do list. I will leave a link to the research in the show notes. If you want to learn more, you can find those show notes at bobbirebell.com/podcast/courtneyreum. C-O-U-R-T-N-E-Y-R-E-U-M.

Bobbi Rebell:
Financial grownup tip number two. Courtney talks about checking the bill, and how the mistakes are usually not in your favor. No matter how much money you have, check the bill. I'm not alone in having caught so many things on bills that just should not be there. It happens so much, and as for tipping, I do believe you still aren't expected to tip on the tax, even though tipping expectations have certainly gone up in recent years.

Bobbi Rebell:
By the way my friends, did you catch the random knowledge about phone numbers that Courtney shared? Rewind if you need to. I was fascinated. Maybe everyone knows that and I'm the only one. Anyway, Courtney crammed some amazing wisdom into this episode, raising the bar for my future guests, just saying. Keep an eye on this guy, and thanks Courtney, for 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.