FinLitMonth Archives - AFCPE

#MyFinLitStory: Alice Huffman, AFC® Candidate

Rachael Deleon — Wed, 01 May 2019 14:00:12 +0000

My short personal financial story began in 1979 when my husband joined the Navy. We struggled with the same personal financial challenges that young Sailors and Marines still face today. They included living paycheck-to-paycheck, mismanaging checking accounts, not building savings and making poor choices with credit.

I have worked with a military non-profit organization for the past twenty-two years and tapping in to those experiences has helped me to connect with the young Sailors, Marines and families I serve and educate. As an AFC® Candidate, I have found that each session has taught me new skills, reinforced those I already have and developed in me an even stronger desire to help our military focus on their financial management, goals and future.

~Alice Huffman, AFC® Candidate

#MyFinLitStory #FLM19

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#MyFinLitStory: Janeil Pierre

Rachael Deleon — Tue, 30 Apr 2019 11:00:08 +0000

My name is Janeil Pierre, I am an aspiring AFC and this is my personal finance story…

I was born and raised on a tiny island in the Caribbean by the name of Trinidad. I was the first of 3 children and my mom was a single parent. Growing up it was always evident that we didn’t have enough money even though my mom was doing her entire best. I knew back then that I didn’t want us to always live that way, so I pledged to study hard, get a good paying job, and take care of my mother.

At 16, I graduated high school and migrated to the United States that same month; however, it would be years before I was in a position to take care of my mom. After leaving my grandmother’s home in Maryland at 19, I moved to New York, and it was a struggle. But struggling to make it was what gave me the tools I needed to jumpstart my relationship with money. I made very little money, so I lived off of very little money. I was careful to not take on any debt in the form of loans or credit cards, and I budgeted every single paycheck down to the last penny. I shopped only when I needed to, and I was sure to have a list of the items I needed before leaving the house. At that time, living like that was so frustrating, but looking back, I don’t regret it one bit.

At 27, I still wasn’t near where I wanted to be in life financially and I felt the urge to do something that was so much bigger than me. So, without thorough thought, I signed up for the military – the Army to be exact! Once I got to my first unit in early 2012, I realized that a lot of my new buddies weren’t really as knowledgeable in the personal finance department as I was. They were making huge money mistakes, they weren’t using any type of budget, and they typically didn’t know a lot about credit. Now all the years I spent struggling, researching, learning, and practicing all that I can to better myself, I was able to use it to help others. It was such an amazing feat to help others and see their excitement when things started falling into place for them. Needless to say, that ignited a new passion in me to help others achieve their financial goals, all while perfecting my own.

I am now in a position to not only help take care of my mom, but to also help others, and there is no greater feeling than that! I love everything about personal finance and my dream is to continue to help others enjoy some of the same successes I have by being financially literate, responsible, and disciplined.

~Janeil Pierre

#MyFinLitStory #FLM19

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#MyFinLitStory: Cindy Morita, LCSW

Rachael Deleon — Mon, 29 Apr 2019 11:00:41 +0000

I have been a social worker for almost 20 years and have worked with survivors of intimate partner violence. Over the years, survivors would share with me that one of the main reasons that they remain with or return to their abusers was because they could not financially care for themselves and/or their children. Furthermore, from my experience, I also found that survivors were highly likely to experience poverty and struggle financially.

Social workers often work with families that are experiencing financial distress. Often these families rely on social workers for resources and support; however, many social workers do not possess the financial skills, knowledge base, and/or training necessary to help clients build long-term financial security and financial well-being.

I am working towards my Doctorate of Social Work and my capstone project is focusing on building financial capability for survivors. I think that the families that we work with often lack access to traditional financial guidance. As part of this journey, I decided it was important for me to also work towards being an Accredited Financial Counselor. I believe that having the financial skills and principles will help me to better understand how to fill the gap.

~Cindy Morita, LCSW

#MyFinLitStory #FLM19

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#MyFinLitStory: Brooke Grossman, AFC® Candidate

Rachael Deleon — Fri, 26 Apr 2019 11:00:46 +0000

Independent. Bold. Resourceful. When you are 19 years old, these are the words you are expected to be described as before even having the experience and yet, these were the words that I lived by at such an early age.

#MyFinLitStory was just beginning to unfold as I was leaving my hometown of Baltimore, MD to marry my Marine and move to 29 Palms, CA. When we were first together, my husband saw a girl who seemed to have it all in order – from being able to pay rent in her own apartment, to having a car of her own, to going to college and working a steady job. What he didn’t see right away were the loans required to be taken out to pay the bills in the wintertime when work was slow, the car note that was at an 18% interest rate, and the many hours at work and school combined to maintain those bills. He still wanted to marry her anyway.

Once we were married, the first priority was for me to get added to the bank account and credit card and to have him take over my car loan to reduce the rate and cut the payment in half. We then took the cash from our small wedding and moved across the USA with that Cobalt filled with essentials from towels, my clothes, an air mattress, and a cat to a home we would build from scratch. As we sat on the floor of our kitchen eating on a box, I still remember saying that no matter what, we will eat well, even if we didn’t have a table. We purchased our first table only due to having company over for dinner. Neither of us realized at that time how starting from scratch without the help of parents how much we would appreciate starting from the bottom, so to speak.

Now, 12 years later, I sit back and reflect from the beginning on how we were able to work together to save, pay off debts, and build our home to have everything we have owned from vehicles, countless tools, experiences, and currently provide for two beautiful daughters. We made it important to have communication about finances as a couple even if they were not easy conversations. We didn’t judge each other for the financial stories that we brought into the relationship from our childhood without finding ways to work through them together.

My hope is that from #MyFinLitStory and the experience I gained from when I married my husband up until now that I can empower other couples to set aside differences to work together to reach goals and to be able to walk together on their financial path towards these goals.

“Money is an opportunity to reach unity in marriage. When couples work together, they can do anything.” -Unknown

~Brooke Grossman, AFC® Candidate

#MyFinLitStory #FLM19

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#MyFinLitStory: Thomas Saunders

Rachael Deleon — Thu, 25 Apr 2019 13:25:37 +0000

Financial literacy equates to social freedom and independence from consumerism that stunt our upward mobility. We are bombarded with these images of status and unrealistic comparison of what life could be like if we had things. In contrast we see in real life the consequences to over spending, lack of debt management, and the fall out of financial ignorance.

In my family, like many others, we didn’t talk about money mainly because we had none. When there was money, it was spent on wants instead of needs like rent or groceries. When my mother was in between jobs, my brother and I were often homeless, till eventually we were taken by the state in my early teens.

Growing up exceedingly poor and surrounded by those that made poor choices or had limited social mobility, whether due to institutional limitations or as a product of their own making, gave me sense of anxiety about having nothing. Seeing the effects of severe addiction, poverty, and prostitution on people’s behaviors scarred me. Not that as a young man I would tell anybody, but I thought there was a frightening desperation in their eyes.

Luckily, the group home where we were sent allowed and encouraged job skills. I had a mentor named Gorge Ortega who was a positive influence on me and talked about the power of social mobility. As a result, I thought about money a lot in my teens and worked an average of 30 hours a week during high school.

Unfortunately, due to spending half my life at that point sporadically going to school, I was a year behind. I knew that I wanted to go to college for something that helped people. At first, I thought nursing, then psychology. I wasn’t set on one thing, but I knew I wanted to make a positive difference in the world. Mr. Ortega help me direct my focus on counseling and helping others. I was accepted to the University of South Carolina where I received my undergrad in Psychology. I graduated with only $5,000.00 in debt.

Eventually, I accepted an education and training position with the Marine Corps in Okinawa, Japan where I found my love of teaching and working one-on-one with clients. Ultimately, I decided to get my MBA from University of Maryland University College in order to pursue a position as a Personal Financial Management Specialist with the Navy. In 2018, I accepted a job in Rota Spain to work with Fleet and Family Support doing a job, I feel, I was always meant to do.

Looking back at the dirty ten-year-old stealing ramen noodles to eat or sleeping in sheds, I feel a sense of awe. I think you cannot see where your path is going to take you, and if you try, it only limits the possibilities.

To me, financial literacy is not just about understanding how to manage your finances, it’s how to direct your life with your own hands. This is something that I take with me every time I sit down with a client. When I help others find that “ah-ha!” moment, where they know they can make changes or get control, I feel great and can’t wait to do it again.

~Thomas Saunders

#MyFinLitStory #FLM19

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#MyFinLitStory: Renee McElroy

Rachael Deleon — Wed, 24 Apr 2019 13:42:39 +0000

My name is Renee McElroy and I am a Financial Coach for MakingChange, a nonprofit organization that offers financial wellness programs in Maryland.

My financial journey started from childhood, as I was raised by a single mother in the projects of Washington, D.C. Even though my mother never had a lot of money, we never felt as though we were “poor.” She always paid her bills and we always had clothes, food and all the things we needed growing up.

I learned a lot about basic budgeting from my mother. The rest I learned from school in formal financial literacy classes. Being able to give back to the community I serve has been a long-time passion for me. I love my work and love helping families and individuals achieve their goals and dreams for the future, as well as helping them just have a better life than they had when they walked into my office.

~Renee McElroy

#MyFinLitStory #FLM19

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#MyFinLitStory: Joseph Driscoll

Rachael Deleon — Tue, 23 Apr 2019 11:00:17 +0000

I am currently an Active Duty U.S. Coast Guard and I make twenty years of service this month! I have truly enjoyed my time in the USCG but my true passion is my side hustle! I have a great passion for finance and truly enjoy seeing people change their relationships with money!

I have been leading people from all walks of life (including military and civilian) toward achieving financial independence. As a family man, I understand the responsibilities and pressures that can bring. My wife and I have walked in most people’s shoes – living paycheck to paycheck and feeling like you can’t ever get ahead. We were able to pay off $52,000 dollars of debt in two years and have been living debt free since 2015!

I help people understand their behavior with money and show them how to win with money! Income is just a number. A lot of people truly don’t know how to control their money.

~Joseph Driscoll

#MyFinLitStory #FLM19

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#MyFinLitStory: Jackie Lam, AFC® candidate

Rachael Deleon — Mon, 22 Apr 2019 11:00:50 +0000

I used hate money.

Okay, so hate is a tad strong. Maybe not so much hate, but I definitely was afraid of it, and I was fascinated by it. From an early age I saw how it affected the people around me. Namely, the adults.

My first memories about money were pretty ugly.

For one, my parents were divorced and fought constantly about money. My mom had to take my dad to court for child support. “Bills bills bills,” was something I oftentimes heard my mom saying after a long of day of work.

We lived in subsidized housing for a few years, we were poor. And my mom used to collect cans to recycle in exchange for coins. I remember once after we went to the recycling center my mom had misplaced a handful of change. Now, this might not seem like a big deal, right. I mean, what was that? A couple of bucks?

But to give a little context, At the time she was raising two kids on her own, going to school for nursing and also working full-time at a nail salon. It was a handful, as you might imagine. She was so stressed out about money that she burst into tears.

As you can see, there was a lot of chaos and confusion in my family about finances.

So I came to think of money as this evil monster of sorts that had to be destroyed, or in the very least controlled. Because I saw how important money was and how not having enough could really create problems and create a lot of strife.

And maybe it was a subconscious act for me to want to control something that the grownups around me found to be so important and yet was also such a huge source of pain and agony.

So in my own way, I sought out to control this evil beast that was money. Or at least to better understand it.

This continued throughout my life and I came to the conclusion that being frugal meant being free. The less you spend, the fewer bills you have to pay, and the less you need to worried about money. Or so that’s the theory, right? To me, frugality was a way to be resourceful and creative.

And through my blog, which was called Cheapsters, I met fellow frugal folks. Some who were doing amazing things by being cheap. My one friend Joel got laid off from his day job, took a severance package, and traveled the world for two years. Other friends were living on 800 bucks a month in Los Angeles. Funny as it sounds, frugality was in many ways was my religion.

Fast forward to the present, and interestingly enough, I’m now a personal finance writer. And what I wanted to share with everyone today is what you can do to turn your money situation around. I’m not going to tell you to start saving in a retirement account, or that you should have three to six months of living expenses in your emergency fund. That’s old news and it’s boring. In my own humble opinion, information is pretty useless without a connection to yourself.

So let’s talk about the self, shall we. I’ve found that what financial wholeness boils down to is having a good relationship with your money. Yes, that’s right, it’s talking to your money, it’s being honest with how you feel about your money, and it’s about how you treat your money.

And here’s thing: because nobody, even someone like me, who spends tons of time learning about how money works has a “perfect” relationship with money. And while yes, I can cover my bills and yes, I do have a chunk of change squirreled away for a rainy day fund (both good things, right?), I struggle with my own problems.

For instance, I am the absolute worst at spending. Yes it’s a little weird, but I’m the kind of person who has spent a good hour at a shoe store toiling over whether I should spend $50 on a pair of boots. It affects my quality of life and adds unneeded stress. Ladies and Gentlemen, you were witnessing the fast times of Jackie Lam.

And some days I still feel like I hate money. How it will always control an element of our lives. But I urge all to start by being honest with yourselves. It’s only by getting real with what’s going on that you can make improvements. Because we’re all a work in progress, and I believe you have the answers within.

Now, as an AFC^®candidate, I would like to help fellow freelancing creatives and artists with their relationship with money – by offering knowledge, resources, and support.

~Jackie Lam

#MyFinLitStory #FLM19

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#MyFinLitStory: Jenelle Davis

Rachael Deleon — Fri, 19 Apr 2019 11:59:57 +0000

In my childhood, my parents didn’t speak about money. I didn’t know how to save money. I didn’t know how to manage my finances. I thought a piggy bank was the cool thing to have sitting on top of your dresser in your bedroom. I grew up thinking money grows on trees. However, my perspective on money changed when I entered adulthood.

After making a few mistakes with managing my finances in college, I wanted to make sure others didn’t have to suffer like I did. I wanted money to be a topic of conversation with everyone, but especially with children. I began to fight for self-efficacy, for myself and for others, and started working in a credit union in late 2013. After working my way through the organization and developing my career, I accepted my newest role as a Financial Wellness Educator at SEFCU in Albany, New York in 2018. I now work as a part of a team in SEFCU’s Institute for Financial Well-Being and recently celebrated with the organization as they received a National Award from the Credit Union National Association (CUNA). SEFCU was recognized for their ongoing efforts to deliver free, dynamic financial education to young people with its Desjardins Award for Youth Financial Education in the more than $1 billion in assets category.

As an educator with the Institute, I travel every week educating children, youth, and adults in the community. We have traveled across the state to provide free Financial Education and look forward to, one day, crossing state lines. As a professional in the field, I feel that my passion for financial education contributes to my connection with the Association for Financial Counseling and Planning Education^® because it means I’ve joined a bigger vision to ensure that all people achieve financial wellness regardless of their backgrounds or income. I don’t want people to just live, I want people to thrive with their finances, and it means making the decision to positively impact everyone I connect with.

~ Jenelle Davis

#MyFinLitStory #FLM19

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#MyFinLitStory: Lauren Gillett, AFC® candidate

Rachael Deleon — Thu, 18 Apr 2019 16:24:33 +0000

I am an AFC^® candidate. The road that lead me here began with a financial course I participated in years ago. It changed our lives dramatically. So much so that I found my passion and direction in life. I finished my Bachelor’s degree in Finance and am now studying for the AFC^®exam and working towards my certification hours.

Sharing financial knowledge with Service members and their families is my privilege. I am now teaching the class that changed my life in hopes of changing the lives of others.

~Lauren Gillett, AFC® candidate

#MyFinLitStory #FLM19

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#MyFinLitStory: Lynn White

Rachael Deleon — Wed, 17 Apr 2019 14:57:58 +0000

I began my career as a “homemaking teacher” and taught students in a rural school how to use their talents to both make and use money to build their future. Two years later I became a Family Economics Specialist with Texas A&M Agrilife Extension and created puzzles, lesson guides, and basic facts sheets to help families from the lowest income levels to the highest learn to plan for reaching their goals using a calendar and other tools to budget and plan cash flow.

I began my doctoral studies with financial management courses from Purdue in coordination with adult education, human resource management, and consumer marketing research courses at Texas A&M University. My dissertation addressed financial competencies needed to be financially successful. As I reviewed literature in financial management, I saw that more education, more income, fewer children, and starting early in learning to budget, save, and invest were key factors. I kept asking myself why some people with all of these advantages fail, while some people without these advantages succeed financially. Using the family systems theory, I decided to explore what happens in the “through put” process that causes like inputs to create different outputs.

From the human resources classes, I learned about behavioral anchored rating scales that are used to evaluate employees’ capability to perform required job competencies. Using that model, I asked 27 financial management experts from a broad scope of financial fields to complete a three stage Delphi study through which they identified financial management competencies adults need for successful financial management, and how they would describe performance of those competencies at ideal, adequate and inadequate levels.

Key findings: It’s challenging for people to define adequate and easy to define ideal and inadequate competency performance. Thus, people are stressed trying to achieve ideal performance of all skills when adequate is a great need for many people.

Of the 18 competencies identified, number one was the ability to set goals with the ability to determine how each decision would take them toward or away from their goals. Starting to make changes that are goal focused (pay down debt for example) is more likely to lead to success than having more money.

What surprised me most is that being able to reduce one’s tax liabilities as they planned savings and investments ranked #14 in importance. I asked why, since this is a primary focus of a lot of financial planning. I was told people need to look at their goals first. Will a tax reducing option lead to their goal, such as ability to purchase a home, or will it make money inaccessible or available at high costs when needed for their goals?

That study was in 1985, but I truly believe that when I voluntarily teach families facing financial challenges or youth starting their independent financial management roles, these are key factors to guide my instruction.

~ Lynn White

#MyFinLitStory #FLM19

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#MyFinLitStory: Sarah Ellis, AFC®

Rachael Deleon — Mon, 15 Apr 2019 10:24:45 +0000

Growing up in a very old school home environment we did not talk about money. We did not talk about salaries, bills, or savings. Everything I teach was NOT discussed and if you brought it up you got in trouble. Needless to say, when I finally went out into the great big world, I did not know anything about money management. I did not know how credit cards or loans worked, and I got myself in trouble! Everything I know about financial literacy I know because I did it WRONG!

Eleven years ago, I started my personal finance rehab. I started paying attention to my credit and making sure my bills were paid on time. I still occasionally make an impulsive purchase that maybe I should have waited on, but my finances are strong. I have retirement, savings, and a strong credit score. I have two children that know WAY more about money than I ever did. My eldest son has a savings account that he has money automatically transferred to each pay check and he is building credit. I’ve always been very open and honest about money with my children.

Professionally, I tell all my clients they are not their mistakes they have made with their money. You can feel like a failure when you don’t know how to properly manage your money, but you can learn how to, and I am here to help. It takes time and dedication, but it’s so worth it.

~ Sarah Ellis, AFC^®

#MyFinLitStory #FLM19

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