Ep. 3 - Chelsea Brennan - How ‘Smart Money Mamas’ Can Grow Wealth & Protect Our Families
Chelsea Brennan is the money mama we all need in life. She shares her journey from hedge fund manager to launching Smart Money Mamas, a venture serving women from all walks. From the death of loved ones and divorce to financial abuse and wealth building aspirations, the stories of the women she serves are riveting. She talks us through how to set up a trust or will, what to do if you need to transition out of alternative investments, and we explore what it can look like to be a stay-at-home parent with financial security. Chelsea tells us that while women normally manage the budget in a family, they are more rarely the ones who handle investing. She gives us the tools and money habits we need to rethink financial independence. Chelsea has contributed to Forbes and regularly featured in publications like INSIDER, the Huffington Post, Scary Mommy, Netflix and more.
To learn more about Chelsea’s 30 Days to Investing Confidence, visit Smart Money Mamas
Episode Transcript
Christina Honkonen (00:20):
Chelsea Brennan, welcome to the Pitch Cast. Thanks for joining.
Chelsea Brennan (00:24):
Thank you so much for having me.
Christina Honkonen (00:25):
Yeah. So you run Smart Money Mamas, and I confess, I listened to your story on Journey to launch a few years ago and just was really blown away and intrigued, inspired all of the things. Thank you. It's a really cool story. I'm sure others out there have heard it, but for listeners who haven't, do you mind starting from the beginning and telling us a little bit about how you got from your hedge fund world to where you are today?
Chelsea Brennan (00:51):
Absolutely. So first of all, Jamila is amazing. It over a journey to launch, I had such great conversation with her. She and I are close, but, so my story starts way back, um, when I was a kid. And so I was always really interested in how many worked in the world. Um, I was a kid who was reading economics and stock books when I was 13, and I just, I really wanted to understand how people built wealth. It was something that was very intriguing to me. And so when I got to college, um, I also had this side of me that really loves to teach and interact with individuals and wanted to have some kind of impact. And so I had to make a decision between going the Wall Street route, um, or becoming a teacher. And it was a really difficult decision. And what I ended up kind of coming to, and this is just how my brain worked at the time, was if I could make some money early in my career, I have more choices when I was older.
(01:33)
Right? And so I hadn't been introduced really to the concept of financial independence at that point, but I knew that I could kind of build a nest egg early on. And so I went the Wall Street route. Um, I worked in equity research in New York for about three and a half years, and then I moved on to a hedge fund in Boston, uh, where I, it's where I made VP and where I took over my own portfolio. And by the end of my career there, by my end of my time there, I was managing over a billion dollars, um, for a distressed debt fund. And so, which is really cool, and I tell people all the time, like, there are parts of that job that I loved, it was intellectually stimulating. I got to really understand these niche businesses and how they came to be, um, and take companies through bankruptcy is just a fascinating experience.
(02:12)
And we won't d dive too deep into that, but it was just a very cool thing. But I was away from my family a lot. Um, as soon as we had our first child, it was very evident how much I wasn't home. Um, I was gone before he woke up in the morning and I got back in time to put him to sleep. Basically, I, I hung out with him for 10 minutes, read him a book and put him to bed. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And that was just not sustainable, uh, for me. And so we started to explore other options. I looked into a lot of different entrepreneurial options. I got minutes away from going to be the c e o of a startup in the healthcare space and walked away from that just because of some, like, concerns about the business model, um, and how they were thinking about some compliance issues that made me a little nervous.
(02:52)
And so I walked away. Interesting. And it was like two days later that we had a snow day. So we, like, we're told not to go into the office. Boston can get some crazy snow. And I said to my husband, I'm like, you know, I've had this idea in the back of my head since college that we used to, I jokingly in college called it Build Me a Budget, whereas like, if you could have a Weight Watchers for your money where you had somebody you talked to and somebody who can give you some guidance. Yeah. And so I've had this idea forever. I've been in this mom's group of over 200 women who had their first baby in the same month that I had my first baby. And I'd become their go-to person for money questions. And I was like, I'm just gonna sit down and answer some of their questions as an article.
(03:25)
And so we started the blog that day. I published my first blog post that day, and then for 30 days I answered somebody's question every day. I wrote a post every day. That's incredible. Um, which was a lot of work. And so people are always like, how did you, you know, how did you make time for that with your career and with the baby? And it's like the baby went to bed, right? I got home and put him to bed mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And then I, I'd read a post or whatever. And then on the weekends I'd write when he napped. And I really fell in love with it. And we started to see, you know, these, these wins from moms who made it not necessarily the how to budget conversation, because let's be honest, budgeting is simple math. Like we all understand <laugh> spend less than you make mm-hmm.
(04:02)
<affirmative>. Um, but there's an emotional component to it and a mindset component to it that's really important that people weren't talking about in a way that really understood, you know, motherhood and parenthood and things like that. And so we got into it. I got pregnant with my second child. Um, we started to grow that business and I just really started to pull away from my job in a sense that I had a difficult health pregnancy. I was really loving what I was doing at Mama's Talk Money, which was, or, um, mama Fish Saves, which was the original name of the blog. We rebranded mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Uh, and so, uh, at 32 weeks pregnant with my second, my water broke and I ended up in the hospital who's early, it's eight weeks early. For those of you who are parents, it's eight weeks early. Uh, and so we get to the hospital, we have this doctor comes in who's like, you've had a baby before you're gonna go into labor in the next seven, two hours.
(04:45)
He toured us through the nicu. Um, and I said to my husband, I can't do this anymore. I was still getting questions from work. Um, we'd been preparing for financial independence for years at that point. We weren't yet there. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, but we reached Coast five. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And we looked and said like, Hey, it was December. And I was like, Hey, I bet if I called my company. And so they had told us in the past like, listen, if you're ever gonna not come back after maternity leave, just tell us like we'll pay you through maternity leave. Like we just need to plan. That's great though. We just need to know. Yeah. So I said like, I bet if I would've reached out to them and said, I'm having this health issue, I gotta go mm-hmm. <affirmative>, um, I'm gonna have to recover after this, this pregnancy.
(05:21)
I bet they'll pay me my bonus and whatever. And so, 'cause it was December and that was a big concern, right? 'cause in that industry, two thirds of your income is your bonus. And so I called them and they said, yeah, like, that's fine. We totally understand. And so they gave us more runway. And so we knew we had two years in cash and we were close by. And so I was like, let's see if I can make this business work. And we said, if it wasn't showing signs of working in a year, I'd start to look for other finance jobs. And if it was showing signs of working, we'd take that other year of runway to keep scaling. And so that's what we did. I, I quit from my hospital bed. I signed the paperwork. Um, my water did this thing that for those of you, your parents will shocked, that won't make sense to other of you. But my water resealed, which is this thing that happens basically never, um,
Christina Honkonen (06:03):
I've never heard of that <laugh>.
Chelsea Brennan (06:04):
I've never heard of that. Yeah. I was, so I was in, um, a very famous hospital in Boston that is like the NICU center of the world. And they were like, we see this super rarely. Uh, so I carried to 39 weeks. My baby was born full
Christina Honkonen (06:15):
Term. That's incredible.
Chelsea Brennan (06:17):
Um, he was healthy and we just took smart money. Mom was full-time from that day on. So it was fantastic.
Christina Honkonen (06:23):
Wow. Wow. Okay. So I got distracted with your water resealing. Like I've never <laugh>
Chelsea Brennan (06:30):
Super weird. It's super weird. Never
Christina Honkonen (06:32):
Heard of that before. That is crazy. So today, how is, what does the makeup of your income flow look like? Do you feel like you've replaced your income or as you've done so as much as you wanted to? Like, what does that success look like for you today? And then of course I wanna hear about like, which of these resources is really helpful? I know they all are, but most helpful for people getting started or, or jumping in, like what's out there that you'd be like, you've got to get into this program, or I'd send you to this resource. That was a double barrelled question. So have fun
Chelsea Brennan (07:02):
<laugh>. Um, so I would say, so we're doing what? Well, um, I wouldn't say we've replaced my income and I don't know
Christina Honkonen (07:08):
If fun income,
Chelsea Brennan (07:09):
The goal, I dunno, it was not the goal. Um, it'd be nice. We're not there. You're right. And so a few things. So we've been full-time with this for four years now. Um, I had very bad postpartum depression after my first and my second. And so that, thank you. It is hard. And so that first kind of year was keeping our heads above water. And then that second year was really, and so we gave ourselves that other year. We weren't quite where we wanted to be at the end of the first year with that runway. But we were like, you know what? Like, you didn't get to do what you wanted to do with it. And so we spent the second year figuring out, okay, what do we really wanna do with this? And so we're a little bit off base with where I thought I would've been.
(07:43)
Um, but we're in a good place. And so we have two main sources of income. The primary is what we call our Motivated mama society. That's our monthly membership community. And that has an in-depth, uh, foundations course that takes people through healing your money mindset, setting meaningful goals, and then how to create the wealth building engine that gets you to those goals. And so, um, and it, it's really unique in a way that there's not do this specific thing. It empowers you to find the system that works for your personality because I don't believe there's like one best budgeting app or one best way to do things. It's, it's generally what are your goals and, and how do you work and how does your brain work? And so that's our, our main source. And then our second that is, is close is our emergency binder.
(08:26)
So our first ever product we launched, um, on the site was eight months after I left my job. It was the family emergency binder, which came about, it was originally something I created for my husband and I when I was pregnant with our first, uh, he's a stay-at-home dad. Um, he was in construction and he was a yacht captain before, but he's not a finance guy, right? And so I have always managed our money and I was sitting in the nurse's office, you have to go get a physical right for your, for your life insurance exam. And I'm sitting there and I'm like, oh my God, what if something happens to me? He will have no idea. Right? No idea. And not even that, he's gonna be handed the biggest check he's ever seen in his life, right? <laugh> and totally terrified. And so the first thing that I wrote, the first page I wrote was like, step-by-step.
(09:09)
It was like very simple five steps. Here's what to do when you get this life insurance check. Like first things first high yield savings account for six months. I don't want you to touch it until you're a little bit out of the grief. Right? Here's like, do this, here's where our emergency fund is. All those kind of things. And it grew into all our account numbers and our logins. And then we started developing the system where one month a year we do what's called our financial fire drill. And I step out and he manages everything. So he uses the binder, he goes through, he updates our budget, he pays our bills, and if anything he gets stuck. We know where we need to update the binder. And so we turned this into a fillable product. We launched it and it was fantastic. Um, it's done really well for us. We've helped, um, I think at this point, over 18,000 families, um, get this set up.
Christina Honkonen (09:54):
That's incredible. Did you say 18,000 families?
Chelsea Brennan (09:58):
Yeah. Wow. And it was actually on Netflix's show, dead to me, uh, in
Christina Honkonen (10:02):
Season two. Oh my
Chelsea Brennan (10:03):
Gosh. Which was, oh, ma, I got this email from the production team about wanting to talk to me about using the binder. And I totally thought it was spam, right? Like I was like,
Christina Honkonen (10:12):
Yeah, oh, I would've too, like mm-hmm. <affirmative>.
Chelsea Brennan (10:15):
But, um, my right hand at Smart Money Mamas, uh, she started her career as a production assistant in Hollywood. And so I sent it to her and she's like, no, this is 100% legit. Call 'em back. And so I called them back and they were like, we normally would draft something up like this as a prop. We would just make it ourselves. But somebody who works on the prop team for Dead to me has purchased your binder in the past and is like, Hey, this actually exists. And so it was really cool. There's like two shots of it in season two, but one of them that's wild Zoom in and it's a clx uh, a crux point of season two. So that was really fun.
Christina Honkonen (10:46):
That's amazing.
Chelsea Brennan (10:47):
Yeah. And so those two things. And so
Christina Honkonen (10:49):
Product placement for free
Chelsea Brennan (10:51):
Oh, product placement. It was so cool. It was so cool. And it was also a show I'd already watched too, which was the fun part. And I got to see like, the script of where it was gonna be beforehand. And that was all fun. Um, but, and so that product is done really well. We actually spun it out onto its own site in January of this year because our audience at Smart Money Mom is, is primarily moms. Our audience for the binder is pretty 50 50. And so we wanted a place that like, um, that anyone could access it. And it's also something we've talked about, like whether you don't have young kids, like we have a version. If you don't have kids or if you have grown kids, um, if you are a single person, it's actually even more important, right? Because there is nobody that knows how you manage your system, right? <laugh>. And so we wanted to make it more widely accessible. And so now that sits on emergency binders.com
Christina Honkonen (11:37):
Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, that's awesome. I confess. So I've always managed the money too in our household just because it's of interest to me. And that's it. I'm not a former hedge fund manager. But you don't
Chelsea Brennan (11:47):
Need to be <laugh>
Christina Honkonen (11:49):
All I'm, all he's got is me. So he has to deal. Um, so, but, and I occasionally, I'm like, this is where the accounts are. Like I have like a Word document. It's the most immature, like not, you know, it's just not gonna cut it if I actually do bite it. You know, like, so I don't know that that, I think that is so, so needed. And it does scare me. I'm like, I, I'll be like, this is where the accounts are. This is everything. But I don't know, I don't know if he's paying attention, you know, or I move the Word document. You
Chelsea Brennan (12:22):
Move it, uh, your computer, like is it backed up somewhere? Does he know how to access if it's backed up? And there's things that like we have to process, maybe in a best case scenario, he could figure it out, right? But if something happens to you, whether you're sick, whether you're temporarily incapacitated, whether you do pass away, he's not gonna be in the best state of mind, <laugh>, right? And if it's not him, if, if it, you know, God forbid has to be another family member that steps in, they really need that, that handhold. And so we talk about it all the time, is this true act of love for your family and especially for your kids if you do have young kids, right? Because you wanna create as much stability for them as possible, which is why the part for parents, um, the version for parents has things like, what are your kids' favorite foods?
(13:02)
What are your family's holiday traditions? So that if someone else has to step up and be their guardian, they can try to give them a little bit of, you know, reminders and stability and tradition at home. And so, um, it is something, unfortunately it means that we hear a lot of people's horror stories. 'cause they tend to come to us when something bad has happened. And some of them are hilarious. Like there's this guy who, it was the first month we bought the binder. He was like, my father-in-law just died. He has told everybody forever that all the information is in the safe. It's in the safe, it's in the safe, it's in the safe. He never told anybody the code of the safe <laugh>
Christina Honkonen (13:34):
Stop it. So,
Chelsea Brennan (13:35):
Um, they, he's like, we ripped the office apart. It's a built into the house safe.
Christina Honkonen (13:42):
No it is not.
Chelsea Brennan (13:43):
He's like, I'm Googling, how'd crack this safe? And he is like, I'm not on some F B I watch list at this point. And then they didn't wanna drill the safe out because then you damage the safe and it's built into the house that they now wanna sell. And so they ultimately did have to drill into it and find the paperwork. But he was like,
Christina Honkonen (13:57):
I'm sure how else would you get it open? No
Chelsea Brennan (13:59):
One thought to ask, you know, and they had to call it a professional, how do I get, okay, well I'm glad it's in the safe. How do I get into the safe? Um, and so some, and then some things are just, just awful. We had, um, a woman who wrote in a young woman. She was 18 and a half, her father passed away. Um, right after she turned 18. He had named her and her younger sister as beneficiaries on everything. And typically if she was under 18, that would've been put into the hands of the state with a conservator that would help her manage that. If she's 18, it's all on her. Um, and while her mother was still living, they were divorced and her mom wasn't on any of the paperwork. And so no one wanted to talk to her mom. And so she had to deal with her father's whole estate basically by herself. Um, and so these are the things that, like, they're horrible to hear, but we're so glad to have this product that can remove some of that heartache for people. Mm-hmm.
Christina Honkonen (14:46):
<affirmative>. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So I was gonna ask you about wills and trust, but this feels like a fitting time. So where do you start? Like if, if you are talking to somebody who, we'll just use me 'cause you're talking to me. Um, frugal, have a family far, like we, we've met Coast Phi. Um, what else? That's about it. So where would you say we should start? I don't love the idea of having to spend a ton of time on it. I don't wanna go find a lawyer and sit with them in person. Don't wanna chat. What um, <laugh> am I your normal, um, customer? Where do we start <laugh>?
Chelsea Brennan (15:23):
Yeah. So I mean, the first place you wanna start is, is with a will. And so trust can be a really great option. And if you're someone who's close by and pursuing PHI with, with a significant amount of assets and by significant amount of assets, I mean a net worth of over $500,000 excluding your home, right? Um, you really wanna start to think about a trust because you don't want your kids to be handed massive amounts of money. Um, and you also wanna be in a situation where if your kids are young and Do you have kids Christina? Sorry.
Christina Honkonen (15:48):
Yeah, we do. We have two kids, I should've mentioned that <laugh>,
Chelsea Brennan (15:51):
Um, if you have minor children and that money ends up, so if you name it to them, which naming your kids as beneficiaries is, is a nightmare <laugh>, right? As we talked about with the girl who just turned 18. And if it ends up in conservative ship with the state, um, your, whoever's your child's guardian has to present every single receipt for reimbursement. And it's, it's a expensive headache of a process. But if you end up, so what some parents do to get around that, because they don't wanna talk to people and they don't want it to take too long, they're like, I'll just name my kid's guardian as the primary beneficiary. No matter how much you trust those people. Money makes people do crazy things. Um, and not everybody manages money well. And so there are some, so you really wanna make sure that if you have a significant amount of assets that would last beyond caring for your children in those minor years, which you know that big number, you're gonna wanna set up some kind of trust and you're gonna wanna make sure that there's stipulations that you get to say, and this is where I want my money to go and win.
(16:44)
You can do trust online. Um, trust and Will is my favorite resource to do that. Um, the thing with trusts is I think that there's a place, uh, uh, an important place where trust with a lawyer as much as it's gonna be more expensive and more time consuming, it's worth it, right? Because if you don't do that, a will goes through probate first of all. So a will goes through probate, which you're gonna have all those expenses, which I guarantee you'll be more expensive than your trust expenses. And wills are public. And so anyone who is named in your will, your children, your beneficiaries, your guardians, all of their information is published with the will. And so you have people who check court records and they send scams and they do all kinds of things.
Christina Honkonen (17:27):
Ah, gross.
Chelsea Brennan (17:28):
It's awful. <laugh> and so awful trust. And the reason we talk about the size of that estate right, is because probate costs usually come out to some percentage of the estate. And so we wanna make sure that not only is the trust, the right thing to manage your assets through your kids' early adulthood, but that it's not that it is most cost effective versus a will. And when you get to those bigger numbers, that's when you have that money lasting longer and it's when paying the upfront cost of the trust, which can be anywhere if you do it through trust and will, it's like $400. Um, but if you do it through another ser, if you do it through a lawyer, it might be 2,500 right? To kind of, it's in there. And so you wanna start with the will mostly because you wanna have those guardians for your kids in place.
(18:09)
Um, and you wanna have the basics in place. If you're getting to the point where you have more assets and you wanna trust, then you go set that up. That is a time consuming process no matter who you do it through. Um, having that conversation with a lawyer that's gonna take time and all of those things. But even when you use a service like trust and will, you have to change the names on all of your accounts and all of your assets to be an ownership of the trust. So your trust will be issued an e i n number, it will have its own tax id. And so everything has to be in the trust's name. If you don't fund the trust, if you don't move anything you paid to set it up, but it's just an empty vessel. And so all their assets that weren't named into the trust are still gonna have to go through probate and you're gonna have like defeated the whole purpose <laugh>, which happens far too often. And so the trust are time consuming process, but you really wanna start with that. Will you wanna make sure your beneficiaries are named out that your kids' guardians are named out? Um, we've already been talking to this for a while. Uh, do we wanna talk for a quick second about what happens if you don't name your guardians? 'cause this is something that you think Yeah.
Christina Honkonen (19:05):
Okay. Absolutely. Yeah,
Chelsea Brennan (19:07):
People think all the time. I told my sister that if something ever happened to us, I would really want her to have the kids. And like that will be fine. Like they'll, she'll claim them and that'll be fine. She'll
Christina Honkonen (19:17):
End up with the kids. Everybody lives happily ever after.
Chelsea Brennan (19:19):
That's not how it happens. And so what happens is it goes to family court, um, and family court decides who takes your children. And so there will be basically an open call. Anyone who wants custody of the kids in the family, friends, uh, I think
Christina Honkonen (19:31):
My heart just stopped.
Chelsea Brennan (19:32):
Can, can go claim this process can take six months to a year depending on the state that you live in. Um, and they will look at things like everyone who submits their financial background and their stability, the, the court's definition of their stability. And so the example that we talk about a lot is like, okay, you've got two siblings, one of which you are, have the same values on. You really want that person to be with your kid and then you have this other sibling that you're fine, but like you just have really different styles and opinions, right? And then, but your sibling that you don't have as many agreements with is more financially stable and lives closer to you. The court is going to give your kids to that person every single time. And so when you have, when you have laid out that you've named that person as the guardian, you've set up a trust or you've named your life insurance policy with a beneficiary to that person that you want it to go with.
(20:23)
So they have financial means, they will choose that person, right? It's still gonna go to family court, but it's a much faster process when the parent has picked somebody and that person is aware and wants the kids. If both of those things happen, that process is quick. The court approves the person and we move on. But we, it it's a very difficult process. And so this actually happened, um, to a neighbor of ours several years ago. Um, the mother, it was a single mom. The dad hadn't been in the picture since the kid was born. She had a, she was a a, um, a military vet. She passed away. Uh, her daughter was two and a half and her dad came and claimed custody. Uh, he had his own instability issues and things, but the other thing that takes priority is, is closeness of family member.
(21:04)
Right? And so her grandparents, uh, the daughter's grandparents wanted her and she was used to them. She'd been with them since her mother died. Uh, but it was an eight month battle to get them to have custody. Um, and they had to, you know, hire a PI and show that he was, it was just a lot of stuff that happened there. And so you really wanna make sure naming guardians, you don't even really have to complete your will to do that. You can name a guardian. So trust and will, I think it's $39 you can go and fill out. Like it takes less than 10 minutes and just name your guardians. Um, the last thing I'll say is if it's, if the reason you haven't named Guardians is because you and your spouse don't agree, you each have to name guardians separately. Like you're gonna do that anyway. It sounds crazy, but like if you can't agree, just name different people, just
Christina Honkonen (21:52):
Name people it's
Chelsea Brennan (21:53):
Name different people and it's gonna be last man's idea. Like
Christina Honkonen (21:55):
It's like right? And
Chelsea Brennan (21:57):
You want something on paper because you don't want your kids to have to go through all that uncertainty. Talk to social, social service workers, do all those kind of things if they don't have to.
Christina Honkonen (22:06):
Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Mm-hmm <affirmative>. Yeah. That's horrifying.
Chelsea Brennan (22:10):
It, it's really sad. It's really sad. That's
Christina Honkonen (22:12):
So, so sad. So it does remind me of a question I wanted to ask you, which was about the type of scenarios that people are in, women and men, and when they come to you, I'm assuming you've seen, you see a wide variety, but I'm curious, is it always the worst case scenario or somewhere in between? Like what does that look like?
Chelsea Brennan (22:31):
So our biggest definition, we talk to people. Oh, so do you mean I'm gonna talk about Smart Money Mamas for a whole here for a second? Yeah. 'cause emergency binders, we get people in all walks of life, all situations. We have people that have just become adults that realize they need to start organizing some of these things 'cause they're in their own house for the first time. And then we have people that are 80 and they're like, crap, I don't have anything organized. Right? <laugh>. So that's a whole different picture. Smart Money Mom is, the way we talk about it a lot is we get women in transition. So I just had a baby, my baby just went to school and I have way more time than I thought. I wanna go back in the workforce. I'm an empty nester or I just got divorced and this is what we hear all the time, right?
(23:05)
These are, there are things that are changing or I want them to change. I'm not happy with the way things are and I need to get my crap together. New moms super popular time, right? We're living that early adulthood. We kind of know we have to manage our money, but maybe we're not doing the best job. And then, oh crap, I'm responsible for another human being, <laugh>, I gotta get this together. And so we do a lot of that. We do a lot of, um, people in divorce or who really just wanna make a big career change and they're like, how do I do this? How do I start my business? How do I save up enough to be able to make a leap to do something else? And so that's, we always talk about it as women in transition are our biggest audience.
Christina Honkonen (23:41):
So let's talk, I wanna talk about the divorced women because, and this is a funny, weird reason. My daughter is three years old. So I run a business, I started a business, run a business half for five years. I run it with my husband. I've always managed our finances, run a team, an independent female being <laugh>. And my three-year-old daughter, she's three. So we'll, we'll, we'll laugh about this, but I'm also really proud of her. She wants to have five babies.
Chelsea Brennan (24:09):
Okay?
Christina Honkonen (24:10):
Okay. And um, and I said, well one day, you know, you, what are you gonna do to make money? 'cause I, you need to be able to make money. Like mommy makes money. And she said, you're gonna make the money and I'm gonna watch the babies <laugh>. And she's really hilariously like adamant about this that she will not be working. She handful,
Chelsea Brennan (24:27):
She's gonna be having babies.
Christina Honkonen (24:28):
And I'm like, respect? Uh, a hundred percent respect. 'cause five babies. Okay, so joking aside, 'cause she's three and she'll probably end up being the next president, first female president. Hope there's one before then, but oh God, maybe the second <laugh>. So my question is, um, what do, what would you say to women who both want, let, let's just like put workers aside for a second. Say, you know, you're not gonna work because that's, you know, that, I mean, being a full-time mom is a lot of work and I feel like I, so we can have, we can talk about this offline or one day, but you know, there's so much pressure on women to keep working, keep having the babies like breastfeed, do all the things. But for those women who are like my three-year-old daughter and are like, Hmm, that's crazy. Like why would you ever ask that of me? Um, <laugh>, what would you tell them to do to have a handle on finances too or what else? Whatever else comes to mind for you.
Chelsea Brennan (25:25):
So I have a super interesting perspective on this because my husband is a stay-at-home dad. Um, and I am the daughter of a mother who is a stay-at-home mom for 20 years and got divorced, um, quickly and unexpectedly and didn't have a college degree, hadn't worked for 20 years and was pretty stuck. And we're gonna just for a second here, just brag on her. 'cause that was eight years ago. She now runs a half a million dollar business consulting business and she's amazing and I'm so proud of her and just fantastic. But when we were getting married, I made 10 x what my husband made, right? And it was actually really funny the first time the idea of be any him being a stay at home parent came up was actually from my father-in-law, <laugh>. And so he had read this article in the New York Times about how highly successful women typically have a husband that has taken a step back. And because of the way that we expect workers to work, being full-time parents and full-time at the job and all the things, there needs to be somebody, whether you hire that somebody or you're married to that somebody that's backing it up, right? And so he came over, I was home alone, he comes over, we lived at this point like 15 minutes from my in-laws. He comes over with this article, <laugh>, he walks in the house
Christina Honkonen (26:35):
Intervention time. I
Chelsea Brennan (26:36):
Just read this. I think Jeremiah would be a great stay-at-home dad. And I was like, what? Like what is going on? I don't think we were engaged yet, if I'm remembering the time yet. Like we were just dating. It was hilarious. And so Jay came home, I was like, you'll never believe the conversation I had with your dad today. And he was like, would that be an option? I was like, that's a great idea. I was like, how many conversations have we had about I make 10 x what you make? Yes. Like if you wanna stay home, it's an option. I'm not a huge fan of it. And he was like, well, why not? Like all the reasons dad was saying like, makes sense. And I was like, include my mom, <laugh>. She's completely stuck. And so I had a lot of fear about it and we had really intense conversations.
(27:18)
And what we ended up doing I think is something to think about for any person who wants to be a stay at home parent. And the first thing we did is made sure that he was going to remain employable. And so he got his master's degree, um, in construction engineering and project management. Um, he, which he did online while he was still working. He used to be a yacht captain. So very large. I wanna talk about that later. It's the coolest, crazy story. Uh, he's a very interesting career background. Yeah. But you have to have a very high level license to do that kind of work. And so we have maintained that license. Um, we have made sure that he's gotten his boat hours to do maintain that license so that if something happened to me, he would be employable or, and this is a conversation that's hard to have, right?
(27:58)
Especially when you're early in your marriage or you know, everything is blissful and happy and you're expecting your first baby. If you don't wanna be with the person you married anymore as the stay at home partner, you do not wanna be stuck there out of you don't have another choice, right? Like, and so that was a conversation I had with him of, I never want you to be here because you have to be here and so I want you to have an option. And so we did those things for his career. We've kind of kept his foot in the door, he updates his resume, um, every couple years and kind of just sends it out and it's like, Hey, does this still look good? Or whatever. And so there are some things we wanna keep our foot in the door. So that's a big thing with employment.
(28:36)
And this could be for, for a stay at home mom, this could be a side hustle. This could be five hours a week. I don't like have one freelance client or, or something like that. That's just enough to keep going. Or at least, you know, kind of maintain a network. The second part is being heavily involved in the money. And so you can be as the stay-at-home parent, the c f o of your house, right? Typically as a stay-at-home parent, you're the one actually spending the most money. You're the one grocery shopping, you're the one buying the kids' clothes, you're the one doing all those things. And so when you are the one who takes a handle on the budget and takes a handle on, on how are we saving and what are we saving for, you get that deep understanding of the current situation and the future situation.
(29:14)
'cause it's very common, especially among women that we do manage the budget over two thirds of heterosexual couples. The woman manages the budget, but a very, very small percentage takes any control of the investing or understanding of the investing. And so you wanna have both sides of that, right? You wanna have a picture because you need to know what's happening if something happened to your spouse, if you got divorced or your spouse might not quite know what they're doing. And so I have a friend of mine that runs a large, uh, mortgage underwriting business, and she and I have the most interesting conversations. She said the things that continue to shock her are almost without fail. Um, the woman is always the one filling out the mortgage paperwork. And the majority of the time she understates how much she makes and overstates how much her husband makes when they actually get the pay stubs in.
(29:59)
She's like, you know, this is wrong. Right? Wow. That just gave me pills. They don't even know how much money they make. It makes me so angry. Well actually there's like a fidelity study from a few years ago that like most people can't name how much their spouse makes within $8,000. Wow. These our conversations that we have, right? Yeah. Yeah. And when you think about the fact that the median income in the US for a family is $56,000 <laugh>, $8,000 a big swing. So big swing. Yeah. Yeah. And so they can't, so they always overstay. Um, and then the sad part is how often she has to have conversations with women that fill out this paperwork that their husband was managing the money, they were managing the investments and they didn't do what they said they were doing. And so she fills out what she thinks the assets are and the paperwork comes in.
(30:43)
And my friend's got a call and be like, sweetie, you don't have these assets, or your credit score is ter your husband's credit score is terrible and I can't underwrite you a mortgage. And they have to kind of start from the beginning. And so you want to stay involved and not necessarily, like, we're not trying to think that they're intentionally doing something cruel. It's just that none of us are educated about this except as a society we expect, and this is so much pressure on men too. Like there's, there's obviously a lot of BSS we could talk about and women and money, but there's some BSS involved with men are just expected to know how this works. And so they continue to act like they know how it works. Yeah. Even when they're completely confused, right? And so, um, you just wanna be involved. And so those are the big things is being involved and have your foot in the door.
(31:23)
Um, just for safety sake and for options. The last thing I'll touch on, 'cause I I tend to get long-winded on this topic is, is financial abuse. And this is a tough one, right? Um, a lot of people don't, aren't aware of what financial abuse is. We're getting, we're hearing more and more about it. But over 90, 99% of physical abuse cases started with financial abuse. Um, when you think about any kind of abuse, physical, emotional, financial, it's about limiting someone's autonomy and their, and they're challenging their way of thought. And so when you restrict someone's financial, um, autonomy, right? It is very difficult to leave a bad situation. It's very difficult to trust yourself. We really damage that money mindset and that sense of self worth. And so, and it can happen so slowly. I think this is another reason that you need to be involved, right?
(32:12)
And so we, we dealt with a woman about two years ago and we've dealt with a lot of these women. We dealt with a woman about two years ago who reached out and said, Hey, like I was a nurse. Like I was an rn. We had our first baby. I wanted to be a stay-at-home mom for the first couple years, right? I wanted to get her to preschool. And like then I was gonna go back just to work. My husband was on board and the baby turned one and I was missing my job, but I brought it up and he shut it down really fast. Like, no, you said you wanted this for our daughter, whatever. And she was like, you know what? You're right. Like I said, I'll stay till she's three. And so whatever. As she got closer to that three-year-old birthday, it caused an argument every time she brought up working.
(32:47)
And she's like, he sabotaged some of my interviews, right? Like called and canceled them before I could go to them and things like that. And she's like, and it started to get really worrisome. And then I went to check on our, our, uh, bank accounts and he had taken her off a bunch of their bank accounts and so she didn't have access. And so these are the things that you wanna make sure you have a sense of what's going on, that you have that sense of power. This is a place where if you have been the C F O, if you are watching out for what are the red flags, right? Are they overly overbearing about how much you spend and where, um, do they impact your career? Show up unexpectedly, you know, interrupt interviews, things like that. Um, are they taking you off of accounts limiting access?
(33:28)
Are they opening credit in your name without your permission? Right? Because that happens a lot. And so we need to make sure that no matter how much we love our spouse, no matter how much we wanna be a stay at home parent, that we are involved enough to protect ourselves. And if you're gonna be a parent to protect your kids, um, because this is a sad thing that unfortunately it happens far too often. Uh, we interviewed somebody from the National Center for Domestic Violence, um, about a year and a half ago, and she was saying the number of women who are stuck in physical violence situations because they don't have the financial means to leave, and that means their kids are stuck in that situation. We all wanna think that would never happen. Um, but I want you to just take the steps to protect yourself in case, because, uh, when I was at my first job, which is a very large bank on Wall Street, uh, in New York, we had a, um, managing director woman come speak to the young woman's network within the company.
(34:16)
She got up and she told the story about how her first husband ended up being physically abusive and how she was there for three years before she left. And she's like, people look at me and they're like, she's Ivy League graduate, you graduate. Mm-hmm. It never happened. And she's an amazing job. And like this would never happen. And she's like, they abusers are good at isolating you and reducing you and making it feel like it's your fault and all those things. And so she's like, just be aware. Don't judge people who are in these situations, don't judge people who are stuck and take the steps no matter where you are in life that you're protected. And so that's the kind of like, as much as those are the difficult things to think about, those are what we have to think about. Be before we become a stay home parent because it's easy.
(34:55)
And my husband was doing it too, right? It's like, this is great. Like you have a better job, you have more vacation time. Like I'll be able to, like, anytime you wanna go on a vacation, I won't have to like apply for my two weeks a week. Like this is just gonna be better. We won't have to pay for daycare. And that was his big thing. He was like, well, my salary's like just gonna cover daycare <laugh>. That's not how this works though. You have to think about the length of your career, um, and all those other kinds of things. And so those are the the questions I'd ask yourself and are you comfortable with those risks? And are you protecting yourself from those risks? And then love it. There's nothing wrong with being a stay at home parent. Obviously <laugh>, it's a hard job. It's a ridiculous job. Uh, but you just wanna make sure that you're safe.
Christina Honkonen (35:32):
Yeah, I think that's incredibly helpful. So thank you. Um, I also wanna talk because right now we're not quite in a recession, but who knows, maybe they'll be, start calling it what it is any minute now. Um, but what, so all of us have lost money if we're invested in the market. Many people,
Chelsea Brennan (35:52):
The value of your investments have fallen, but you own the same number of shares and units that you did before. <laugh>, you'll only lose money if you sell those investments. So let's talk about it that way.
Christina Honkonen (36:02):
<laugh>. Yeah. Nobody go, uh, jump off the roof yet. So for, for those of us who, it feels like we've lost a lot of money right now, we're feeling the drama and the heat. It's not fun. And uh, I think most people around, uh, I'm 38, so I, I think even people in my age group haven't lived as an investor through a, a long prolonged recession. I think that's fair to say. Um, 'cause 2008, you know, it was ugly and it felt bad, but man, oh man, was that that bear market right after that pretty, um, that bull market pretty lovely. So, uh, I'd take a 2008 over a 2000 or a 1970 any day bring it on. Um, but let's just like sit for a second in this pain <laugh> with them, with listeners. Um, and, and also I, so I think there are people who are like obviously maybe in V T S A X and um, in a couple individual stocks and it feels yucky, but you know, we kind of know we can ride it out even though I don't want 10 years of a 2% yield. I'm not really, doesn't sound fun, but we'll, we'll make it. And then there's others who've like lost a lot of money due to like crypto or some alternative investments. Are you feel or are people coming to you in these various scenarios right now and going like, what do I do? And if they're not, what do you do <laugh>?
Chelsea Brennan (37:23):
Yeah, so it's actually really interesting. Um, we plan out our year for our membership, um, 12 months in advance. So we always have what's coming up. And so we had planned our 30 days to invest in confidence course for, uh, June. So we just finished 30 days to invest in confidence. And this is actually gonna be available as a separate course by the end of the summer that anyone could buy. Even if you're not in our membership, that's awesome. But doing this as the market is crashing was a really fascinating experience to like talk to hundreds of women who are like, but is that the time? Right? There's so much, so much freaking out. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>,
Christina Honkonen (37:52):
You're like, it's a great time to invest. Yeah. So,
Chelsea Brennan (37:55):
Right. And so, um, I totally feel the pain. I think the first part is, we hear this all the time, um, we hear a lot of people who are not experienced in the investing are only watching headlines or far more frightening to me is watching TikTok and they're like, I found this, you know, this person says this is the opportunity to do this, or, you know, all these different things. And so we get lots of questions and a ton of questions about alternatives and crypto, um, and you know, and NFTs and things like that of like, is this better? Right? Is this better than the stock market and all these things? I think we've seen what happens with crypto, right? As much as the crypto people like to talk about it being disconnected to the markets not disconnected from the market. And so I think the big thing is to remember what your timeline is.
(38:39)
Um, we do live in a really strange period of time where most, um, adults or middle-aged people have not lived through. Even a lot of us haven't even lived through 2008, right? Like we didn't, we weren't really invested in 2008, so we saw it, but we weren't impacted by it. And that means, and we've seen this like unprecedented 14 year bull market. And so I talk to people who are like, no, I've been single stock investing for five years and I'm doing awesome. And I'm like, okay. But it's really easy to win when the market's going up and even and define win, right? When you actually get those people down to like, okay, can you actually compare your returns to v t s ax? And then they're like, oh crap, I actually underperformed not right now. Yeah, yeah. Um, and not right now, but I'm saying like even over the past five years, right?
(39:23)
And so, um, it's going back to what is your timeline? Uh, what are your goals? And if you are in your thirties and you're gonna retire, you know, even if you're gonna early retire in your fifties, if you've got 20 years, 15, 20 years, you've gotta put the head in the sand, right? And keep doing what you're doing. You picked a system for a reason. Um, we have heard all different funny ways that people make sure that they stick to when they start to get scared. Oh, I wanna hear it. Um, we have a, we have a member of our community who has her friend change her password to her investment account. That's awesome. Um, <laugh>, she doesn't have access. So she, the automatic monthly deposits still go in, but she don't touch it. Does not touch it. Yes. Um, all all kinds of things, right?
(40:01)
Like the sticky notes on the fridge of like, we're in it for the long term, all the kind of phrases that we have and try to just ride it out. Now, if you're, this is easy to say for someone who is already in a rational kind of index fund managed system, you're gonna stick to your system. But if you're somebody, and this is what we are hearing more and more, if you're somebody who has been doing that single stock investing, who's, god forbid, been doing, like options in margin trading, right? Or crypto or alternatives, you might be looking at the way you've been investing and say, I can't ride this out. Like this isn't actually how I think I need to invest for the next 30 years. And how do I make the changes in a down market? And the benefit is what, you know, crypto's down a lot.
(40:45)
Um, alternatives are down a lot, but so is the market. And so it's not a terrible time to switch to another asset class. It is gonna result, you know, and, and you'll probably take, you are likely in taxable accounts with those kind of investments. And so when you make that switch, you'll take all loss on those investments and then that will help you kinda offset it some tax gains in the future because those do carry forward. And so that, that could be a positive, not a positive, but you know, equaling it out a little bit more. Um, but it, it's coming back to the drawing board and saying, okay, here are the reasons that I chose this method. Do they still hold true? Um, where did I learn about this method? And am I comfortable with the person that was teaching me this method? And then really kind of resetting.
(41:24)
And once we reset, don't go to a place of, I'm just not gonna invest at all <laugh> and stay out of the market through the downturn, but really pick a better method and make sure you're reinvesting that money so that you take the upswing when we get to the upswing. Um, the hard part about being in a 14 year bull market is we don't know what this downturn is gonna look like. Valuations have been, valuations have been illogical for, I mean, five, six years, right? We've been hearing, I heard the first like we're we're preparing for the second recession in like late 2011, right? Like this is every year. That's true. And, and we heard the fed right for the past five, six years say, Hey, if we keep keeping interest rates this low, we're gonna hit inflation, we're gonna hit inflation, we're gonna hit inflation.
(42:06)
Um, but they were encouraged to keep the rates low and keep the economy moving in. So now we're gonna see those, the impacts of those things. But from an in investing perspective, you really just wanna pick a good system. The thing on cryptos and alternatives, um, for me is that they're meant to be a very small percentage of your portfolio. Um, and we're talking, you know, zero to 5%, 10% maybe if you have a large enough portfolio that you can withstand a big drop in that money. And with crypto specifically, um, it's a currency, right? And so when we talk about like, if you were building a p if, if crypto didn't exist and you are building a a portfolio, would you be foreign exchange trading? Like no, it's based on interest rates in the global market. And like when we talk about crypto, now we're talking about stroke of the pen risk, which if, for those of you who don't, haven't heard that before, it's stroke of the pen would be if a law was signed into place or a regulation was signed into place, that would drastically change the valuation of your market.
(42:59)
You have stroke of the pen risk. And so cannabis, crypto, they have things that like, we could just completely change the rules and value or devalue everything, right? And so we wanna make sure that we are investing and we aren't gambling, we aren't taking untold risk where we can't really put our arms around what the risk is with those kind of alternatives. And so we want 'em to be a small part of our, our, our portfolio. And I think that we're gonna start to see unfortunately, um, a lot of people who don't have them, uh, can't afford to lose money, are gonna lose money in the next six to six months to a year or two depending on how long this lasts. Um, and that's a sad thing. I mean, I think that, you know, we've watched, at least for me, I've watched courses, you know, online courses come out from people who aren't necessarily financially trained, talking about how to trade margin in Robinhood accounts and how to individually stock pick.
(43:48)
And yeah, it looked fine for a little while. Um, but you really wanna rethink like what is my long-term strategy and what feels really like it's gonna help me build wealth and the way that I wanna build wealth. 'cause that's important too, right? Um, if you're somebody who's like, I don't wanna invest in VITs X because I don't wanna be investing in guns and violence video games, or whatever your thing is, there are things we can talk about, right? There's socially responsible investing, which has its issues, <laugh> and, um, and there's is educating yourself about how that looks and then deciding is there a different alternative, right? Is there, I'm gonna hold my nose and just do the total stock market index, but I'm gonna put a little bit more money towards, towards charitable organizations that matter to me. Right? It's really just having those thoughtful discussions about how do you want your money to work for you and how do you want your money to grow to you, and how can you make it so that you don't feel like you're gonna throw up every other year when the market <laugh>, like Yeah. Um, does something crazy.
Christina Honkonen (44:40):
Yeah. So if somebody found themselves in the situation where they did lose a lot of money in crypto or something else, is that a good time to call you up and be like, let's chat? Or would you say, <laugh> do your research? Like what, what would you say to somebody in that?
Chelsea Brennan (44:53):
So I don't do individual one-on-one coaching. Um, it's a great time to join our membership. Um, I'm very hands-on on the membership, and so I'm in that group kind of every day answering questions and we do monthly q and as, and we do live masterclasses and things like that. But the reason it's a good time to join that is because there's a lot of shame and fear that's associated with that. And so signing, like, what I would probably tell you is like, let's take a minute, let's take a month and kind of put your investments to the side, like try not to think about it. And I want you to go through our mindset course and I want you to figure out, because that's gonna help you see what made me make these investments in the first place. What do I actually want? Um, what do I think I'm capable of? And then we can talk about what's next. And then what would really be next is taking 30 days to invest in confidence, right? Like, let's give you a true understanding of how the market works, why we see ups and downs, and let you create a system that works better for you. And then I'm there to answer questions. Is it likely what we would do with people?
Christina Honkonen (45:44):
Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Um, let's talk a minute about the emotional side of this because just like, it's, it's, it's part of the journey I've found. I can just speak for myself personally, and then some of the folks that we've talked to recently about like getting out of debt, it's part of every single journey no matter where you, like, even I'd consider us like financially stable. Like we've reached Coast Five, like we have a bright future ahead, knock on wood. Um, but it's still emotional and I still have my personal struggles and so does my husband and I, I think they're fun personally, but that's, that's,
Chelsea Brennan (46:17):
You're at the point where they're fun,
Christina Honkonen (46:18):
Right? That's right. That's right. And I, and there's a lot of, um, luck involved in that too, you know? Um, so, but what I wanna ask is like, where does that, what do you see and where if somebody was like to take a step back, I don't, I guess what I wanna ask really is like, what is the emotional side of it? Like how would you describe it to somebody who's like, what does that even mean? Like, I don't have emotional issues with money. Like well, there's an emotional pool with everything in our lives, but Yeah, tell us about that.
Chelsea Brennan (46:46):
Okay, so money is involved with everything that we do. Everything where we live, what we eat, where our kids go to school, where our kids go to daycare, everything we do. And that means that the money isn't really about the money. And so we get people all the time who come to us and like, I have tried five different budgeting apps and journals and I can't do it, and it doesn't seem like it should be this hard, what's going on? And it's like, it's not a structural thing. Like you can do addition and subtraction. I have full confidence in you. Yes. That's not the problem. And so are, are you, you're, I'm assuming you're familiar with Maslow's hierarchy of needs?
Christina Honkonen (47:16):
Yes.
Chelsea Brennan (47:17):
Okay. So we'll talk about, there's actually a, a pin thing in our Instagram about the money hierarchy of needs. And we talk about how each of those five levels is really tied to a money level. And so let's start all the way, and it's actually a really great way to talk about privilege too. We'll about that. Yes. Yes. But we start at the bottom, right, with physiological needs, can you feed yourself? Do you have a safe place to live? Do you have appropriate clothing? That is a money issue. And we live in a capitalist society. And so if you don't have those things, I'm sorry, I can't you, I telling you how to make more money telling you how to chase your passion or pursue financial independence, you are just trying to feed your family, right? Like, you're like, yeah, yeah. Oh, that sounds really important.
(47:53)
Like, I can't do that right now. I am in constant stress and fear around money that doesn't, if you've ever lived at that period, that does not leave you unless you go back and you heal that work, right? And this is where you have to be ready to work with us. Like this is like one of those things where some people are like, yeah, that sounds really hard. <laugh>, and I'm not gonna lie to you. People start, they go through our MedTech course and like without fail, I'd say 80% of 'em at some point posted the group and they're like, okay, I've been in tears for 10 minutes. Like I had no idea. Like I, I've uncovered this memory that I had no idea that, and then it's better, right? Like, but you have to go through that mean moment of hard. And so if you've ever had that, it's gonna tie forward.
(48:34)
The next step up in Maslow's hierarchy in the money hierarchy is safety. And so we talk about financial safety. We're talking about are you not living paycheck to paycheck? Are you out of high interest debt? Do you have an emergency fund? Do you feel like you have a stable place to live? Not only a place to live, but somewhere that like your landlord's not threatening to sell the building every three months. Like, are you safe and secure when we move on beyond that level? Right? And that's where a lot of people are. That's where a lot of Americans are, where we're really trying to just build that sense of safety. And so we get people, and these are people that earn all different levels of income, right? Because spending issues do not necessarily money issues, not necessarily tied to income who are like, I make enough money.
(49:14)
Like, why am I still so stressed about it? And we're like, well, okay, well here's all the reasons that your safety boxes aren't checked. Like, yes, the money is there, but you don't have a foundation that allows you to feel safe and secure. Um, we also uncover some really interesting issues and mindset issues when we come up to this section because we'll have people, uh, my favorite example all the time is people who are like, I can't cut my grocery budget. Right? Like, I have read, everyone says that's where to start and that's where the most money is. But I try and I last for a week and then I go and buy this huge grocery shop and you start to dig in. And that person either had food insecurity when they were younger and we had a lot of siblings that ate dinner at the table really fast, and they never felt like they really got enough food.
(49:52)
And so welcome. That's interesting money. Yeah. They wanna make sure that there is always enough food in their house. And it's, it's not conscious most of the time, right? But they're like, I can't look at my fridge and have empty space, even if it's enough food for us to eat. Like there's a part of my brain that's like, whoa, we're gonna go hungry. And so they stuff it up. And so, and, and so what we talk about is not necessarily starting with your grocery budget. If that's where you are, we wanna get there, but let's not cause like undue difficulty. Let's get you some quick wins in a place that aren't gonna cause you as much trauma. And then when you have a better foundation, then let's work on this other thing, right? And so safety and security, but we move that right to love and belonging.
(50:28)
Love and belonging is a funny one when we come with money. But what I talk about all the time is like, do you feel like you're worthy of wealth? Do you have the time and space and money to invest in your relationships, um, to go on date nights with your spouse to go on vacation with your family, to, you know, have a night out with your friends? Do you have that space to really build relationships? Because often when we're at those two lower levels, especially the bottom one, we're working like crazy, we're super stressed and it does damage our relationship, right? And you go beyond that and we really start to talk about, that's when we're talking about real self-actualization, right? And so we talk, we call the next level, um, um, work flexibility. So you're necessarily financially independent. Yeah, that's, yeah, that makes sense.
(51:09)
But if you have a boss that is mean to you or that you don't feel like you're valued, you can walk away, right? And ization is really financial independence. Are you working because you wanna work your best work? And so as we build that up, these are all emotional things. Maslow's is not about, you know, dollars and cents in some black and white thing. It's about how do we feel as a person in our capability to reach our best selves. And so when you look at money that way, you see that there are places in your life, even if you had a very stable upbringing, that you developed relationships with money that don't necessarily, that aren't necessarily true or don't tie with the rest of your personality. And those have been running in your brain for a really long time. We talk about the fact that research shows core money, beliefs start to be set around age seven.
(51:55)
You didn't have any context for things when you were seven. You heard your parents say something or have an argument or somebody in the store say something, and you made an assumption about how that worked in the world, because we're all looking for stability. So we're taking time and making big assumptions, and then we let that big assumption just run in the background and we look for proof of it, and we look for proof of it, and now we have to work on it. And so, um, real quick, 'cause we're, I know we're, we're good on time, but my, my story, so we talked, one of the things we'll work through in the mindset courses is coming up with your first money memory was the first time you remember really thinking and talking about money. And so for me, uh, the first thing I really wanted to save for that was expensive was this purple game boy, right?
(52:34)
I wanted a game boy. I wanted to play Pokemon Boy. I saved up for, it took me a long time. We got to the store and I am a natural security seeker, which there's like spender saver, security seeker is really just, I wanna make sure I always have what I need. Uh, savers will save until they, you know, for what they need, and then they will buy the thing that they want. Security seekers have a much more difficult time with that because oh my God, what if I need that money tomorrow? And so I'm, I was, I'm right there with you, <laugh> and I, we walk into the, the GameStop and I burst into tears and my dad is like, what is going on? And I was like, I don't know. It took me so long to save this money. Like, what if I don't like the game boy?
(53:12)
I like, what if I don't want it? And whatever. Aw. And I was like, I, and then so I did the thing and I was like, I, I don't think I'm gonna get it. Yeah. And there were a lot of choices my dad could have made in that moment. And I'm not shaming him in or blaming him in any way. He was dealing with his own money mindset issues, which is that he is a massive spender and someone who idolizes wealth. So he got down on my level and he said, I am so proud of
Christina Honkonen (53:33):
You. Oh, wow.
Chelsea Brennan (53:35):
This is gonna serve you so well. Yeah. You're gonna build so much wealth. And then next time he saw me, he saw his friends, he told them the story about how I, he's so
Christina Honkonen (53:44):
Proud of you. Yeah.
Chelsea Brennan (53:45):
He was proud of me. And so to me, time,
Christina Honkonen (53:47):
And you're like, this is a good thing. Reestablished it,
Chelsea Brennan (53:50):
It took me until my early twenties to figure out why. 'cause even when I was working on Wall Street, right, like, it, it was the biggest breakthrough moment that I really started to work on this was I got my first Wall Street bonus and I wanted a bike because I was biking with my friends a lot. And I walked into the bike store and the same thing happened. My eyes started to well up. And this time I was with my mom who has very different money relationship. And she was like, can we talk about what's going on here? Like, you have more than enough money to buy a freaking bicycle. Yep. What is, what is holding you back? And it took from that point, a couple of years to really work through money is a means to an end, not an end in itself. And that I had built this relationship that my bank account and my net worth was equal to my self worth and my worthiness of love and belonging.
(54:36)
And that took a long time to unravel. And so I, I I tell this story one 'cause I want you to just give you an idea of what these things can be and that they might not be immediately apparent, but also because these aren't just for people who are spenders, right? These aren't just for people who are the way we think about being bad with money. You might have, you might be well on the way to phi, but why did you sign up for phi? Like what are you getting at? Like what are you thinking this makes you as a person to pursue phi? And are, is there a reason? Like, are, is there a reason you're going so fast? Is there a reason that this lifestyle is attractive for you? We really wanna work on those mindset things because money is emotional. It ties to, like I said, everything that we do.
Christina Honkonen (55:10):
Yeah. Um, just to reiterate it, we were speaking with somebody the other day who had gotten out of debt and it was a massive amount of debt. And, um, Katie Hier, she's a great episode coming up. Um, and it was, she felt so free and honestly she spoke about this freedom in a way that I can't relate to. And I was like that, I mean, if that's not a wake up call, I don't know what is, you know, there's no reason I shouldn't feel free, but I still struggle with it. And I'm happy to say that because I'm proud of what we have. But I also want to be honest, you know, like we do still have like, you know, challenges and journeys to go on and, and it's part of it. It also is, it's, to me it's what makes money interesting and enriching. So
Chelsea Brennan (55:55):
Yeah. And there are people that get outta debt, right? And they're like, your, your other guests, right? They feel free and they're never gonna go back to debt and they feel amazing. But there are other people who get in that debt cycle, right? We got all the way outta debt and now we're back in debt and we've got all the way out. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And often that's a mindset thing too, because what happens when we're fighting debt, especially with a partner, if you, if you and your partner are both on board, you are fighting this big scary monster together. You have a purpose, there's a reason to save money, you're doing it and then you pay it off and then you have all this extra money every month and you're like, what am I gonna do? And you fall back into hold habits because the goal wasn't what you actually want your life to look like. The goal was to get out of debt because you've heard certain gurus tell you forever, debt is dumb. Get outta debt. Get outta debt. And so you get out debt and you're like, well then what? Hmm. Now what? And so no matter what journey you're on, I think really paying attention to what are the emotions that come up with you around all different areas of money's just an important thing to do.
Christina Honkonen (56:47):
Yeah. Yeah. Um, this has been amazing. I know we've kept you a little over an hour, so this was, I mean, I was so excited to talk with you anyways. I think you're such a bright light and such an incredible resource for women and men too. So thank you for all that you're doing. It's incredibly exciting and we're, we're lucky to have you.
Chelsea Brennan (57:05):
I was so glad to be here. Thank you for having me.
Christina Honkonen (57:07):
Yeah. So for anybody listening, where would you send them to make sure that they don't miss all of your resources?
Chelsea Brennan (57:12):
Uh, so if you go to smart money mamas.com, you'll find pretty much everything linked from there. We are at Smart Money Mamas on all social platforms, both TikTok and Instagram the most. Um, and then if you wanna check out the emergency binder, that's also linked from Smart Way Mamas, but that's emergency binders.com.
Christina Honkonen (57:27):
Okay. Great. Thank you so much Chelsea.
Chelsea Brennan (57:29):
Have a wonderful day.
