WEBVTT - Debt-Free Doesn’t Mean Wealthy… Here’s the Truth 0:00:01.480 --> 0:00:01.880 Hey, y'all. 0:00:01.960 --> 0:00:04.800 Is Laurena Rosa with the latest with Laurena Rosa on 0:00:04.880 --> 0:00:07.880 Black Effects and I cannot wait to see you guys 0:00:07.960 --> 0:00:11.440 at the fourth Annual Black Effect Podcast Festival. Okay, we're 0:00:11.480 --> 0:00:14.440 coming back to Atlanta, Georgia on Saturday, April twenty fifth 0:00:14.480 --> 0:00:18.079 at Palman Yards and it's hosted by me alongside DJ 0:00:18.239 --> 0:00:19.400 MV and charlottagnea God. 0:00:20.600 --> 0:00:22.840 We got drink chances of Noriega and Djafing. 0:00:23.120 --> 0:00:26.600 We gotta keep it positive, Sweetye with My Girl, Christopherne Hayslin. 0:00:27.160 --> 0:00:29.840 We got Reality with the King with My Guide, then 0:00:29.880 --> 0:00:32.479 my brother Carlos King, and y'all know he does reality 0:00:32.600 --> 0:00:34.440 commentary like nobody can. 0:00:35.320 --> 0:00:35.479 Now. 0:00:35.479 --> 0:00:38.040 We also have Don't Call Me White Girl, the podcast 0:00:38.120 --> 0:00:41.440 I Love Mona and Club five twenty podcasts, along with 0:00:41.479 --> 0:00:42.839 the Grits and Eggs podcast. 0:00:42.880 --> 0:00:46.239 So this lineup stack Baby, turn Up. 0:00:46.240 --> 0:00:47.960 You're also gonna want to check out the panels that 0:00:48.000 --> 0:00:50.080 we have lined up too, Feature and keV on stage, 0:00:50.400 --> 0:00:53.640 Pika Sumpter, and John Hope Bryant just to name a few. 0:00:53.960 --> 0:00:57.200 Of course, it's way bigger than podcast. We're bringing the 0:00:57.200 --> 0:01:00.400 Black Effect marketplace with black owned businesses, bus the food 0:01:00.440 --> 0:01:03.920 truck court to keep you fed while you visit us. Okay, listen, 0:01:04.000 --> 0:01:06.199 you don't want to miss this. Tap in and grab 0:01:06.240 --> 0:01:10.319 your ticket down at Black Effect dot Com slash podcast. 0:01:09.959 --> 0:01:14.800 Yesterday Welcome The Money and Wealth with John O'Bryant, a 0:01:14.880 --> 0:01:18.840 production of the Black Effect Podcast Network and iHeartRadio. 0:01:27.000 --> 0:01:27.880 Yo, Yo Yo. 0:01:27.959 --> 0:01:31.280 This is John O'Bryant, and this is the Money and 0:01:31.360 --> 0:01:36.240 Wealth podcast series, season three on iHeartRadio and the Black 0:01:36.280 --> 0:01:39.760 Effect Network. And I want to thank everybody for making 0:01:39.800 --> 0:01:45.760 the podcast a NAACP Image Award nominated podcast and one 0:01:45.800 --> 0:01:48.040 of the top fifty for entrepreneurship in the country and 0:01:48.160 --> 0:01:52.240 top two hundred on every content in the world, not 0:01:52.400 --> 0:01:57.040 for people of color, for everybody, and the get you 0:01:57.040 --> 0:01:58.600 know what, I have a guest on it. As you know, 0:01:58.680 --> 0:02:03.520 it's very rare. These are outliers, these are unique leaders. 0:02:03.520 --> 0:02:07.000 These are people who bring something well more than I 0:02:07.000 --> 0:02:08.000 can bring myself. 0:02:08.680 --> 0:02:10.720 And so you're gonna get a treat. 0:02:10.720 --> 0:02:13.960 The days I'm gonna shut up and let you listen 0:02:14.000 --> 0:02:17.480 to somebody who I think brings a great deal of 0:02:17.560 --> 0:02:21.320 wisdom and perspective. And to be really blunt me be 0:02:21.320 --> 0:02:26.960 for a reader bio to you. She's not playing a 0:02:27.000 --> 0:02:29.040 game with you. I'd say something else if I was 0:02:29.280 --> 0:02:32.640 by the no children were listening, But uh, she's she's 0:02:32.680 --> 0:02:33.480 not playing a game. 0:02:33.520 --> 0:02:35.240 I just drives me nuts. 0:02:37.520 --> 0:02:40.519 All these people out here, and it's Tiffany by the way, 0:02:40.600 --> 0:02:43.320 you know her. There's the budget, the budgetiese star is 0:02:43.360 --> 0:02:45.919 you know, or Tiffany the Budganese Sta, which is a 0:02:45.960 --> 0:02:49.960 beautiful branding for her. But I also don't even want that. 0:02:49.960 --> 0:02:54.880 That sounds a little entertainment ish, it's a little sort 0:02:54.880 --> 0:02:57.840 of slickish. I don't want you to think, even with that, 0:02:57.840 --> 0:03:00.840 that she's not in any way and every way substantive. 0:03:00.880 --> 0:03:02.360 You'll hear again that I read her bio. 0:03:02.720 --> 0:03:06.560 She's incredibly credential, and she volunteered at our whole Global 0:03:06.600 --> 0:03:10.280 forum just recently with my friends from Pink Deer in 0:03:10.440 --> 0:03:13.240 December of twenty twenty five and did an extraordinary job. 0:03:13.240 --> 0:03:15.919 Couldn't walk down the hallways after that without being mobbed 0:03:15.919 --> 0:03:19.320 in a positive way. But there's so many people out 0:03:19.360 --> 0:03:25.640 here playing games on the internet, lying straight into the 0:03:25.639 --> 0:03:29.639 camera talking about money. They don't have experiences. They never 0:03:29.800 --> 0:03:34.960 they've never gained companies, have never run investments that they're 0:03:35.000 --> 0:03:37.080 telling you to do. That they they've never engaged in 0:03:37.480 --> 0:03:39.920 talking about a million, two million, five million, all this 0:03:40.000 --> 0:03:43.200 money that they never had talking about incomes. Don't marry 0:03:43.200 --> 0:03:46.080 somebody if they haven't seen it or received it or 0:03:46.160 --> 0:03:49.160 felt it. I mean, I just just drive me nuts 0:03:49.160 --> 0:03:52.880 and they give me with bad advice. And and so 0:03:53.120 --> 0:03:55.640 if I put my arms around somebody, if I point 0:03:55.680 --> 0:03:58.240 to somebody to the best of my knowledge, know that 0:03:58.320 --> 0:04:01.720 I have vetted them and think that they are straight 0:04:01.800 --> 0:04:03.960 up legit. And of course the New York Times made 0:04:03.960 --> 0:04:07.160 her book of New York Times Bestseller. And again let 0:04:07.160 --> 0:04:11.800 me just read her bio. Tiffany is known to millions 0:04:12.440 --> 0:04:16.120 as the Budgonese sta Is One, and she's one of 0:04:16.120 --> 0:04:20.880 the of America's most trusted voices in personal finance. She's 0:04:20.920 --> 0:04:24.640 an award winning financial educator, a New York Times bestselling 0:04:24.680 --> 0:04:28.919 author of Get Good with Money, and the founder of 0:04:28.960 --> 0:04:31.119 a movement that has been has helped literally millions. 0:04:31.160 --> 0:04:31.840 My wife loves it. 0:04:31.920 --> 0:04:35.919 By the way, shasrum a million has helped more than 0:04:35.960 --> 0:04:40.000 a million women save, manage, and transform their financial lives. Now, 0:04:40.120 --> 0:04:42.400 she's helped women, but it will help you too, if 0:04:42.400 --> 0:04:44.200 you're a man, if you're if you're a Martian. It 0:04:44.240 --> 0:04:46.280 will help you if your Martians come to America. He 0:04:46.320 --> 0:04:47.880 dine on our financial system. You need to talk to, 0:04:48.080 --> 0:04:52.920 need to talk to Tiffany. Tiffany has made financial education practical, empowering, 0:04:52.920 --> 0:04:57.080 and accessible for everyday people, and her impact is reached 0:04:57.080 --> 0:05:00.800 from living rooms to classrooms, including helping them aspire financial 0:05:00.920 --> 0:05:04.400 educational legislation in New Jersey. She's also been featured by 0:05:04.440 --> 0:05:08.000 major major national outlets including The New York Times, Wall 0:05:08.000 --> 0:05:12.120 Street Journal, Time Today, is in The Today Show, and 0:05:12.160 --> 0:05:19.560 Good Morning America. And she also is academically credentialed. And 0:05:19.600 --> 0:05:23.120 I'll let her walk you through all the nine zillion 0:05:23.200 --> 0:05:26.919 licenses and credentials that she has gained, the ones that 0:05:26.960 --> 0:05:29.080 she thinks are relevant for this conversation. I saw her 0:05:29.120 --> 0:05:32.440 recently with Earn your Leisure, Earn your Leisure Guys, and 0:05:33.000 --> 0:05:36.400 she said something that pleasantly surprised me because she got 0:05:36.400 --> 0:05:40.200 it completely right. She said that people be talking about, oh, 0:05:40.320 --> 0:05:43.360 I want to be debt free, and she's. 0:05:43.440 --> 0:05:47.200 Well, my little cousin's debt free. You know, I don't 0:05:47.240 --> 0:05:48.600 mean nothing. He broke U. 0:05:50.480 --> 0:05:51.960 And I would she would say her little cousin, I'd 0:05:51.960 --> 0:05:54.280 say pooky in them. You guys, tell me I got 0:05:54.279 --> 0:05:57.880 the Pooky and them syndrome in my head. But being 0:05:57.960 --> 0:06:01.279 debt free, it means nothing thing if you have no 0:06:01.360 --> 0:06:05.039 income stream, if you have no In fact, I'll flip 0:06:05.040 --> 0:06:08.640 that and I'll challenge her to to talk me to 0:06:09.000 --> 0:06:12.279 say I'm just stupid and wrong. But uh, I say 0:06:12.360 --> 0:06:14.120 you you don't want it's not it's not you want 0:06:14.200 --> 0:06:16.279 don't want debt, you want don't want bad debt, you 0:06:16.279 --> 0:06:19.560 don't want stupid debt, you don't want silly debt. In fact, 0:06:19.640 --> 0:06:26.760 there's no millionaire, multimillionaire, billionaire, uh, city, state, county government 0:06:27.320 --> 0:06:30.400 that didn't do it without good debt. There's no university, 0:06:31.240 --> 0:06:33.560 no company that didn't do it with on the back 0:06:33.560 --> 0:06:36.480 of good debt. So you want to tie to somebody 0:06:36.480 --> 0:06:38.760 that appreciates, not something that depreciates. And that was the 0:06:38.760 --> 0:06:42.719 point she was making on On your Leisure. 0:06:42.760 --> 0:06:43.800 It was a point. 0:06:43.600 --> 0:06:48.640 Where very well made ladies and gentlemen, I bring to 0:06:48.720 --> 0:06:51.080 you the budgeteest welcome to. 0:06:51.960 --> 0:06:52.560 Thank you, John. 0:06:52.640 --> 0:06:54.719 And yeah, I'm actually going that that clip is probably 0:06:54.760 --> 0:06:56.640 like I don't know, five years old. I guess it's 0:06:56.680 --> 0:07:00.040 like recirculating. But I'm gonna I'm going back on a 0:07:00.080 --> 0:07:00.800 few weeks. 0:07:00.720 --> 0:07:01.640 With Tory and Rashad. 0:07:03.160 --> 0:07:06.000 But yes, I will say that people were eating me 0:07:06.120 --> 0:07:09.640 up about that. Oh well, debt freedom is better than nothing. 0:07:10.360 --> 0:07:10.920 Here's the thing. 0:07:11.240 --> 0:07:14.280 The joke I make is that my nephew Roman is 0:07:14.320 --> 0:07:18.720 debt free. He doesn't have a cardinal student loans mortgage. 0:07:18.760 --> 0:07:22.040 But Roman is broke because romans ten years old, right, 0:07:22.240 --> 0:07:27.600 And that debt freedom is not the goal that certainly 0:07:27.760 --> 0:07:29.720 it can be a goal, that's what you want on 0:07:29.760 --> 0:07:32.600 your way to building wealth. And that's the mistake that 0:07:32.640 --> 0:07:36.320 a lot of people make, is that debt freedom by 0:07:36.400 --> 0:07:39.920 itself is not enough to grow the kind of life 0:07:39.920 --> 0:07:44.160 that you want financially. Because our children are debt free, 0:07:44.160 --> 0:07:46.720 and so you know, and there are people who have 0:07:46.800 --> 0:07:48.760 a bunch of debt and still have wealth for themselves. 0:07:48.760 --> 0:07:52.240 So yes, that is something that I've leaded into. Even 0:07:52.240 --> 0:07:53.840 though people fight me on it, I get it. Nobody 0:07:53.880 --> 0:07:57.880 wants to be burdened by credit card debt, but I myself. 0:07:57.920 --> 0:08:00.200 So I have four properties. Now two of them I 0:08:00.280 --> 0:08:02.840 kinda I wasn't expecting to purchase. But there were such 0:08:02.880 --> 0:08:04.960 good deals last year. They came within the same week 0:08:05.000 --> 0:08:08.640 of each other, and I remember thinking, hmmm, I can 0:08:08.720 --> 0:08:15.120 pay for these these homes in cash, but I really 0:08:15.200 --> 0:08:17.160 think I don't want to pull any money out of 0:08:17.160 --> 0:08:21.160 the market. And also too, I didn't want to incur 0:08:22.280 --> 0:08:24.360 you know, I didn't want to miss out on whatever, what, 0:08:24.360 --> 0:08:26.240 whatever growth I might have in the market. So I 0:08:26.280 --> 0:08:29.559 did what's called, well, my bank calls a pledge asset line, 0:08:30.160 --> 0:08:32.080 which essentially I borrow against. 0:08:31.760 --> 0:08:34.400 Myself, which is the Bank of Tiffany. 0:08:34.720 --> 0:08:38.960 Yes, but that essentially is that. And so I borrowed 0:08:38.960 --> 0:08:39.680 against myself. 0:08:40.120 --> 0:08:42.199 Is it a margin account? Is it a margin line 0:08:42.240 --> 0:08:42.760 against your. 0:08:46.440 --> 0:08:49.360 Let's hold on, because you've already gone deep into the 0:08:49.360 --> 0:08:52.360 well of good financial literacy. Let's stop from a given 0:08:52.360 --> 0:08:55.520 that we're both black, we can both have this conversation 0:08:55.600 --> 0:08:58.600 bluntly with our audience. Let's say what no one ever 0:08:58.720 --> 0:09:03.600 tells our people. One of the reasons that people say that. 0:09:03.760 --> 0:09:07.920 And I was just with a very successful person last 0:09:07.920 --> 0:09:10.480 week who said, I just want to pay off my house. 0:09:10.480 --> 0:09:12.120 And I was saying, no, you want to keep a 0:09:12.120 --> 0:09:13.800 mortgage on that the house. I was telling her why 0:09:13.840 --> 0:09:16.000 and all the tax advantages, but she's like, no, it 0:09:16.080 --> 0:09:17.760 just freaks me out, Like I just want to pay 0:09:17.760 --> 0:09:21.400 off the house, and she's had trauma. And black folks, 0:09:21.480 --> 0:09:26.120 after Americans in particular, we've been traumatized by this system. 0:09:26.360 --> 0:09:29.200 We've been trauma. Our descendants were traumatized by slavery, and 0:09:29.240 --> 0:09:32.080 then slavery came, you know, Jim Crow, and then you 0:09:32.160 --> 0:09:34.960 had folks are leasing you lands and then we're going 0:09:35.000 --> 0:09:38.160 to sell you the land and sharecropping. Sham cropping was 0:09:38.160 --> 0:09:40.400 before Jim Crow, and that gamed us. And you have 0:09:40.480 --> 0:09:43.520 the Freeman's Bank and that gamed us. Uh and and 0:09:43.559 --> 0:09:45.920 then Jim Crow, that gamed us. You had you had 0:09:45.960 --> 0:09:47.920 convict lists leasing, that gamed. 0:09:47.679 --> 0:09:49.040 Us, and that red lining. 0:09:49.600 --> 0:09:52.040 You got redlining, and that gamed us and you and 0:09:52.120 --> 0:09:54.720 you and then you you, and you have fraudsters and 0:09:54.720 --> 0:09:57.160 folks just trying to separate your wallet on a regular basis, 0:09:57.160 --> 0:10:00.440 and even folks showing up at the church and that 0:10:00.559 --> 0:10:04.000 might have gained you or you are people you saw grandma, grandpa, 0:10:04.240 --> 0:10:08.559 somebody lose everything, and so we we just paranoid and 0:10:08.720 --> 0:10:11.559 then we get in the market. The last time, the 0:10:11.720 --> 0:10:15.080 two thousand eight crisis probably was the most traumatic because 0:10:15.080 --> 0:10:18.360 we got there, we got these got these adjustable rate 0:10:18.440 --> 0:10:22.280 mortgages UG. We had a negative amortization mortgage. Ug, you 0:10:22.360 --> 0:10:25.640 had Wall Street? Who people protect? Who the people I 0:10:25.800 --> 0:10:28.959 thought they could trust? Who are trying to put a 0:10:28.960 --> 0:10:32.400 postman in a million in a mini mansion and going 0:10:32.480 --> 0:10:33.280 to ever work out? 0:10:33.320 --> 0:10:33.480 Well? 0:10:33.559 --> 0:10:36.080 So so we all now I'm off of real estate. No, no, no, 0:10:36.080 --> 0:10:38.120 don't be off of real estate, be off of stupid decisions. 0:10:38.559 --> 0:10:41.000 Because nobody gave me a bad mortgage in two thousand 0:10:41.040 --> 0:10:45.240 and eight because I wasn't gonna take it. So we're traumatized, yes, 0:10:45.400 --> 0:10:47.840 and that's why we don't want that. We don't want 0:10:47.880 --> 0:10:50.040 we don't want any risk. And so let's deal with 0:10:50.080 --> 0:10:53.280 the trauma, the drama. Let's deal with our low self esteem, 0:10:53.320 --> 0:10:57.520 our insecurities, our fears. Let's address those head on, get 0:10:57.520 --> 0:10:59.680 our hands around it. She's about to educate you now 0:10:59.760 --> 0:11:01.920 now because she doesn't have a self esteem problem. 0:11:02.480 --> 0:11:04.360 Well I did for a long time. 0:11:04.800 --> 0:11:07.959 I'm getting this, but like I'm not vouching for it. 0:11:08.040 --> 0:11:10.079 I'm just saying I read people very well. She has 0:11:10.200 --> 0:11:12.880 confidence and she has acquired self esteem. 0:11:12.960 --> 0:11:13.240 I loved it. 0:11:13.320 --> 0:11:15.600 She said she didn't she did have a self seem problem. 0:11:15.640 --> 0:11:17.560 Because everybody can relate to that, and those who know 0:11:17.600 --> 0:11:25.280 my story y'all's homeless. So from from broke to Blueprint 0:11:25.480 --> 0:11:29.520 the comeback story, Tiffany, you lost your teaching job, got 0:11:29.559 --> 0:11:32.880 scammed out tens of thousands of dollars, ended up moving 0:11:32.960 --> 0:11:35.960 back home with your parents, all while sitting on a 0:11:36.000 --> 0:11:39.280 master's degree. Walk us through that low point and the 0:11:39.320 --> 0:11:42.479 moment you decided to turn your mess into a message. 0:11:43.080 --> 0:11:44.960 So, John, I was fortunate. I grew up in a 0:11:45.000 --> 0:11:48.400 household where money was talked about all the time. My fathers, yeah, 0:11:48.440 --> 0:11:51.600 his master's in economics, his his bachelor's in finance. 0:11:51.760 --> 0:11:53.959 My mother was a nurse with her master. 0:11:54.160 --> 0:11:57.080 So my dad literally, I'm one of five girls, and 0:11:57.120 --> 0:12:00.000 I think he really worried about making sure his girl 0:12:00.160 --> 0:12:02.600 could take care of himselves, so he would do the 0:12:02.640 --> 0:12:04.840 academics when it came to money. Literally, this is how 0:12:04.880 --> 0:12:07.600 you invest, this is how you this is what credit is. 0:12:07.640 --> 0:12:12.280 And my mom was more the actual applied knowledge, like 0:12:12.400 --> 0:12:14.079 now let's go food chopping and I'm gonna show you 0:12:14.120 --> 0:12:17.080 how to do that. And here's how you negotiate, Like anybody, 0:12:17.080 --> 0:12:18.640 if you're buying a car on our household, you bring 0:12:18.640 --> 0:12:21.080 my mother. She's the best negotiator, right. So I had 0:12:21.160 --> 0:12:24.680 that growing up and I listened to them up until 0:12:24.920 --> 0:12:27.760 my mid twenties. And then that's when I decided, as 0:12:27.760 --> 0:12:30.480 the old folks say, you're smelling yourself, and so I 0:12:30.520 --> 0:12:32.480 decided I was grown and I didn't have to take 0:12:32.480 --> 0:12:35.680 their advice anymore. Despite all that education, and I started 0:12:35.679 --> 0:12:39.880 making financial decisions and not running it by these experts 0:12:39.880 --> 0:12:42.640 that had lived through it successfully raising five girls, setting 0:12:42.679 --> 0:12:44.880 us all the college and paying for it. And so 0:12:44.960 --> 0:12:47.080 I bought a condo. I was twenty five. I was 0:12:47.280 --> 0:12:50.480 really proud of myself. I put my down payment down. 0:12:50.559 --> 0:12:53.600 I was still teaching preschool. I taught preschool for ten years. 0:12:53.720 --> 0:12:56.199 It's making like thirty nine between thirty to fifty thousand 0:12:56.240 --> 0:13:00.440 dollars a year depending when I started. And then I 0:13:00.520 --> 0:13:03.400 say thirty five thousand dollars. I put my down payment down. 0:13:03.800 --> 0:13:06.280 Then at twenty six, I got my master's in education. 0:13:07.000 --> 0:13:09.600 Then at twenty seven, twenty eight, I fell victim to 0:13:09.640 --> 0:13:12.320 a credits card scam with a friend who told me 0:13:12.360 --> 0:13:14.400 to take money off of my credit card and invested 0:13:14.480 --> 0:13:17.400 with him. He promptly ran away, and there I was. 0:13:17.840 --> 0:13:20.000 Now all of a sudden, the span of a few years, 0:13:20.240 --> 0:13:22.280 I owe fifty thousand dollars because I had to pay 0:13:22.280 --> 0:13:25.439 for my masters myself in student loan deck two hundred 0:13:25.480 --> 0:13:26.280 and twenty thousand. 0:13:26.559 --> 0:13:27.080 Also that. 0:13:28.640 --> 0:13:29.840 These messages all in here. 0:13:30.440 --> 0:13:33.760 You didn't say a stranger, No a friend now, by 0:13:33.760 --> 0:13:36.680 the way, friend of quotation marks, because clearly wouldn't like that. 0:13:36.679 --> 0:13:39.560 We don't need enemies, no he Yeah. 0:13:39.840 --> 0:13:41.920 So we saved our worst behavior for those we care 0:13:41.960 --> 0:13:46.400 the most about. Right, Nobody curses out homeless peoplecause homeless 0:13:46.400 --> 0:13:46.959 people don't care. 0:13:47.160 --> 0:13:47.880 Right, So. 0:13:49.520 --> 0:13:53.520 Tiffany got scam. You're gonna get scammed if you get 0:13:53.520 --> 0:13:56.760 scammed in all likelihood by somebody who knows you. 0:13:57.000 --> 0:13:59.040 Somebody's gonna come in you with some crazy deal. 0:14:00.200 --> 0:14:04.440 And on the guys that supposedly they love you, to 0:14:04.559 --> 0:14:07.000 quote Bill President Bill Clinton, it's hard to get somebody 0:14:07.000 --> 0:14:09.200 agreed to the truths when the liar's paying their paycheck. 0:14:09.720 --> 0:14:14.560 So so to rationalize is tell rational lies. So Tiffany 0:14:14.640 --> 0:14:17.200 just gave you a lesson here in the midst of 0:14:17.240 --> 0:14:22.160 her lesson that watch every angle, yeah coming at you, 0:14:22.720 --> 0:14:25.040 because just because somebody's related to you doesn't mean they 0:14:25.040 --> 0:14:26.240 have your best interest. 0:14:27.560 --> 0:14:29.760 At hand. Okay, back to you too, And. 0:14:29.720 --> 0:14:31.240 So I should have known it was a scam, but 0:14:31.280 --> 0:14:33.160 I was in my twenties and so because the terms 0:14:33.160 --> 0:14:34.160 were too favorable. 0:14:34.560 --> 0:14:37.640 But the house always wins. Like I was literally justin Vakas. 0:14:37.680 --> 0:14:39.440 I don't gamble, but I was there for a conference, 0:14:39.600 --> 0:14:41.280 and I just remember seeing all these people lined up 0:14:41.320 --> 0:14:43.000 to give away their money, and I thought, the house 0:14:43.040 --> 0:14:47.080 always wins. And so so I had the credit card 0:14:47.160 --> 0:14:51.360 debt thirty five thousand, the student loans fifty thousand, and 0:14:52.320 --> 0:14:55.280 my mortgage two hundred and twenty thousand, and I purchased 0:14:55.440 --> 0:14:57.560 in two thousand and seven, two thousand and eight, so 0:14:57.800 --> 0:15:02.040 right before the the crisis. 0:15:02.080 --> 0:15:03.520 And then I thought. 0:15:04.880 --> 0:15:07.640 The first domino that fell was the scammer went ran 0:15:07.640 --> 0:15:10.840 away with my money and I couldn't find him. And 0:15:10.840 --> 0:15:12.760 now I had to pay off this credit card debt. 0:15:13.240 --> 0:15:15.480 But at first I didn't want to. I was just 0:15:15.480 --> 0:15:17.840 paying the minimum because I told myself, I'm gonna find him. 0:15:17.840 --> 0:15:23.240 He's gonna pay me. I did. I didn't. He's in 0:15:23.320 --> 0:15:23.720 jail now. 0:15:23.760 --> 0:15:24.920 Every once in a while, I was looking up his 0:15:25.040 --> 0:15:28.520 name and his very unique name, and I looked him 0:15:28.600 --> 0:15:30.160 up and I said, wow, he tried to scam the 0:15:30.160 --> 0:15:30.880 federal government. 0:15:31.200 --> 0:15:32.320 And so I caught up with him. 0:15:32.360 --> 0:15:34.560 I was not his only victim, but so he is 0:15:34.600 --> 0:15:38.200 currently sitting in federal jail, which I'm like, eh, anyway. 0:15:37.840 --> 0:15:40.400 You should go visit him and sign a copy of 0:15:40.400 --> 0:15:41.560 book and delivery. 0:15:42.720 --> 0:15:43.000 I know. 0:15:43.600 --> 0:15:45.200 And so that was the first dominum. 0:15:45.520 --> 0:15:49.560 So finally, when I decided, like a year into like me, 0:15:49.840 --> 0:15:52.800 having to pay that debt, I said, Tiffany, you're working, 0:15:53.240 --> 0:15:55.120 just buckle down, you know how to budget, know how 0:15:55.120 --> 0:15:55.360 to save. 0:15:55.480 --> 0:15:56.720 Just pay off this debt. 0:15:56.880 --> 0:15:59.520 And then I found out my school, which was nonprofit 0:15:59.520 --> 0:16:02.200 based law, they're funding during the recession, and they said 0:16:02.240 --> 0:16:05.680 we're closing. So now I owe all this debt. I 0:16:05.840 --> 0:16:09.080 have no income. It's the new school year, and if 0:16:09.080 --> 0:16:12.720 you're a teacher, you know that September you're least likely 0:16:12.760 --> 0:16:15.560 to get hired because everyone the classrooms are full that 0:16:15.640 --> 0:16:17.400 they have to have teachers in the beginning of the 0:16:17.400 --> 0:16:20.360 school year. And so I just remember thinking, what do 0:16:20.400 --> 0:16:22.640 I do Now? I owe all this money, I owe 0:16:22.640 --> 0:16:26.520 my mortgage. I can't afford it. And so I was fortune. 0:16:26.600 --> 0:16:28.800 This is not the case for so many. But my 0:16:28.920 --> 0:16:33.000 parents still lived in New Jersey where I lived, and. 0:16:32.080 --> 0:16:32.960 I moved back home. 0:16:33.040 --> 0:16:36.480 I was twenty nine going on thirty by then, and 0:16:36.560 --> 0:16:38.960 it was a humbling experience because my parents are very 0:16:39.520 --> 0:16:42.800 are immigrant parents straight from Nigeria, which means even though 0:16:42.800 --> 0:16:45.520 you're twenty nine, you're like nineteen, right, And so the 0:16:45.600 --> 0:16:46.360 rules were the rules. 0:16:46.400 --> 0:16:49.680 They were like, what you have twelve midnights, you better 0:16:49.760 --> 0:16:55.280 be in this house. Yes, and so it was really hard. 0:16:56.080 --> 0:16:58.800 But it was then that I said, if I can 0:16:58.880 --> 0:17:02.520 lose a job teaching, there is no safe job. So 0:17:02.640 --> 0:17:05.119 what if I bet on myself instead of like letting 0:17:05.119 --> 0:17:08.080 someone else decide. And that's when I decided. I said, 0:17:08.119 --> 0:17:10.600 you know what I was. I was already kind of 0:17:10.600 --> 0:17:14.199 teaching financial education. I used to volunteer at different nonprofits 0:17:14.240 --> 0:17:17.960 the United Way and churches, the YMCA because I taught, 0:17:18.040 --> 0:17:20.639 you know, I loved teaching and I learned so much 0:17:20.680 --> 0:17:23.359 from about money from home. And I said, well, what 0:17:23.400 --> 0:17:27.040 if I start teaching? And I started the budget NISA. 0:17:27.359 --> 0:17:30.440 First year, I made like I don't even know negative 0:17:30.480 --> 0:17:32.920 amount because I think I was still on unemployment. Second year, 0:17:33.000 --> 0:17:37.040 like twelve thousand dollars for the whole year. It took me, 0:17:37.160 --> 0:17:39.720 like we hear about all the people who make a 0:17:39.720 --> 0:17:42.800 million dollars the first month. No, it took me five 0:17:42.920 --> 0:17:45.719 years to make six figures, my first six figures, and 0:17:45.760 --> 0:17:48.640 that's gross. I remember my take home in that fifth 0:17:48.720 --> 0:17:50.800 year was what I used to make as a preschool teacher. 0:17:51.040 --> 0:17:52.879 So it took me five years just to get my 0:17:52.880 --> 0:17:53.600 income back as. 0:17:53.480 --> 0:17:55.640 A preschool teacher. And in that five years. 0:17:57.359 --> 0:18:00.679 Years exactly, so by then I was like staying with 0:18:00.720 --> 0:18:02.720 my sister, staying with a friend. I mean I was, 0:18:02.880 --> 0:18:05.119 this is in my thirties. I wasn't a kid. And 0:18:05.280 --> 0:18:08.600 then year six I went from six figures to my 0:18:08.680 --> 0:18:12.280 first seventh figure year because of cumulative knowledge. And then 0:18:12.560 --> 0:18:14.840 during the pandemic, we had our first eight figure year, 0:18:15.840 --> 0:18:18.199 you know, and so it just really grew, and so 0:18:18.359 --> 0:18:21.560 did our audience. I mean I I you know, to 0:18:21.600 --> 0:18:25.000 teach financial education really is a privilege and a pleasure 0:18:25.119 --> 0:18:28.560 because people stop me all the time, whether it's TSA, 0:18:29.119 --> 0:18:31.560 whether they're like tivity, we're reading your book collectively, like 0:18:31.600 --> 0:18:33.760 as a group, Like I get stopped by the women 0:18:33.760 --> 0:18:37.040 a TSA all the time, whether it's you know. 0:18:37.640 --> 0:18:39.720 At the Whole Foods or shopwright or whatever. 0:18:39.760 --> 0:18:42.440 People stop me that And what I'm seeing now because 0:18:42.440 --> 0:18:44.720 I've been doing it for sixteen years now is generational. 0:18:44.920 --> 0:18:48.280 So I get the mama and the daughter and the son, 0:18:48.440 --> 0:18:51.080 and so it's just been amazing. But what I'm seeing 0:18:51.359 --> 0:18:55.240 is that are people just people in general general, they 0:18:55.280 --> 0:18:57.760 want to do better, but sometimes they have that they 0:18:57.800 --> 0:19:03.240 don't have the access to aligned culturally aligned financial education. 0:19:03.440 --> 0:19:05.560 Like just say it to me regular is what people 0:19:05.640 --> 0:19:08.120 usually say to me. And so that's what that's that's 0:19:08.160 --> 0:19:10.119 the premise of my business. How can I get you 0:19:10.160 --> 0:19:12.439 to access to financial education so you can change your 0:19:12.480 --> 0:19:13.399 life on your chops. 0:19:16.920 --> 0:19:21.040 And there's also a little bit of a boost that 0:19:21.400 --> 0:19:25.680 you got from I have Africa on my bracelet here 0:19:26.320 --> 0:19:29.480 this is Mandela's prison number where every day but the 0:19:29.520 --> 0:19:33.680 fact that you're from your parents are from Nigeria, which 0:19:33.800 --> 0:19:37.200 are some of the most entrepreneurial, high confidence and high 0:19:37.200 --> 0:19:38.639 self estem people on the planet. 0:19:38.720 --> 0:19:41.200 Someone the smartest on the planet. 0:19:42.040 --> 0:19:45.520 And I did a whole video on how African Americans 0:19:45.520 --> 0:19:48.240 and African Caribbeans and African Africans are the same but 0:19:48.320 --> 0:19:52.879 different and the African American experience we were, as I 0:19:52.880 --> 0:19:55.640 said earlier, our self esteem was beaten down. And even 0:19:55.680 --> 0:19:57.280 though we are the role models for the world and 0:19:57.320 --> 0:20:00.239 aspirational success because we did this in the biggest I mean, 0:20:00.240 --> 0:20:05.239 on the planet America, we still suffer unhealed soul. And 0:20:05.280 --> 0:20:08.080 so those who come from the Caribbean and come from 0:20:08.119 --> 0:20:12.639 Africa theoretically don't happen as much of that burden because 0:20:12.680 --> 0:20:14.600 either he was Caribbean and it wasn't the kind of 0:20:14.640 --> 0:20:17.320