The Get Ready Money Podcast

Teach Your Kids to Be SMART About Money!

• Tony Steuer

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On the latest episode of The Get Ready Money Podcast, I spoke with Anthony Delauney, author and financial dadvisor about changing the way we think about money and helping kids become financially literate. 

In this episode we discussed:

  • The number one reason that people don’t achieve their goals is fear of judgment.
  • Help your kids form their own opinion.
  • Let your kids make the choice.
  • You can introduce concepts at an early age. 
  • The most critical lessons are the fundamentals. 

Anthony Delauney is a financial Dadvisor and the founder of Owning the Dash, LLC, an organization dedicated to promoting childhood financial literacy and family financial freedom. Delauney has written a series of award-winning children’s picture books that each teach basic lessons about money. He has also authored two financial self-help books geared toward helping young couples start their financial journey and toward helping older couples prepare for their transition into retirement.
 
In addition to writing, Anthony has worked in the financial services industry since 2003. He has acquired the professional certifications of Certified Financial Planner(TM) practitioner, Chartered Financial Consultant®, Chartered Retirement Planning Counselor(SM), Retirement Income Certified Professional®, and Behavioral Financial Advisor(TM).


Connect with Anthony Delauney: 

Website (here)
Facebook (here)
Instagram (here)
LinkedIn: Anthony Delauney (here) - Owning the Dash (here)


Book:


Owning the Dash Kids' Books series:

  • Dash and Nikki and The Jellybean Game (the Owning the Dash Kids' Books series Book 1) - (Amazon). https://amzn.to/48TKXQy
  • Lilly and May Learn Why Mom and Dad Work (the Owning the Dash Kids' Books series Book 2) - (Amazon) https://amzn.to/3OaEd7f
  • Rohan and Nyra and Big Sister's Bet (the Owning the Dash Kids' Books series Book 3) - (Amazon) https://amzn.to/4ez6pve
  • Michael and Hannah and the Magic Money Tree (the Owning the Dash Kids' Books series Book 4) - (Amazon) https://amzn.to/4hRORxf
  • Akash and Mila and the Big Jump (the Owning the Dash Kids' Books series Book 5) - (Amazon) https://amzn.to/41867J1
  • Iver and Luke and the Friends-for-Others Club (the Owning the Dash Kids' Books series Book 6) - (Amazon)  https://amzn.to/3AMDVAp


Visit the Owning the Dash store with up to

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The Get Ready Money Podcast and its guests do not provide investment advice. All content is for educational purposes. Guest opinions do not necessarily reflect the opinions of The Get Ready Money Podcast and Tony Steuer.

Speaker 1:

Are you looking to get ready, be prepared and transform your financial future? Then you've come to the right place. This is the Get Ready Money Podcast with Tony Stewart, where Tony has insightful conversations with financial experts who are changing the way we think about money. Catch up on the latest financial trends and hear practical advice from Tony and his expert guests so you can build healthy habits that work, Be empowered with tips for implementing small changes that can have a big impact on your financial future. So sit back and get ready to hear from today's guest.

Speaker 2:

Welcome to the Get Ready Money podcast changing the way we think about money. I'm pleased to be joined today by Anthony Delaney. Anthony is an author and financial dadvisor. In this episode, we'll be discussing Anthony's insights on how we change the way we think about money and being a dadvisor. Anthony, welcome to the Get Ready Money podcast. Thanks for joining us today.

Speaker 3:

Thanks so much for having me. It's great to be here.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I appreciate your time and insights and look forward to learning more about you. So let's get started. What is your origin story?

Speaker 3:

So my origin is I. Originally. I started in the financial services world right out of college. I for those that remember, I put my resume on MonsterJobscom that's a segment age and things like that but a financial advisory company found me and I found out that I loved it. The person that brought me on said you can have the mindset of a capitalist with the heart of a philanthropist, and I thought that was very appropriate, very attractive for that world. And I found out very early in my career that I had a passion for helping families.

Speaker 3:

In serving as an advisor I ended up getting married, purchasing my first home, having one child, having another child and just kind of going all through those fun life stages and realize it's hard enough to plan for yourself, but when you start to have to plan for multiple people, it gets a lot more fun but a lot more complicated.

Speaker 3:

So I just found that I had a passion for helping families and trying to put together the puzzle pieces, as I like to call it. And it wasn't until about five years ago that I discovered that I also had a passion for becoming, for writing Through. Over the years I've always had clients asking me Tony, how do I start talking to my kids about financial literacy and when do I start introducing these concepts and ideas? And I didn't always have the best answer on how to do that and I thought well, one of the best ways we teach the younger generation is through books and through kind of lessons where they get to read something and experience something and then they can form their own opinion, versus us just telling them what to do. So I created the Owning the Dash kids books to basically introduce financial lessons to kids in their elementary school years and those starting years starting off.

Speaker 2:

That's awesome. So you know I agree with you. It's so important to talk to kids and you know about money and help them start doing that so you know, why do you think that people are talking to kids about money? You know, what do you see as some of the things holding people back from those conversations?

Speaker 3:

Well, so one, I think, is that the worlds that we've all grown up in depending on the generation, they've had a totally different introduction to money.

Speaker 3:

For example, back when certain individuals were growing up, there was no such thing as the Internet, and then all of a sudden, in the past 20 years, it's now become even having cash almost seems like an anomaly. An anomaly, whereas back in the day you'd count how many coins you had in your piggy bank or something of that nature. Now it's apps and credit cards and things of that nature where you don't really get to see money as much as you could in the past. So when you couldn't see it as much in the past, it was also hard to talk about it, whereas nowadays it seems a little more comfortable. Parents have a little more ease talking about financial topics with kids, but they didn't grow up with their parents talking to them about those same topics, so they don't know what the roadmap is, when's the right time to discuss certain things and how do you start having that conversation. So I think we're all just constantly learning and trying to adapt to whatever the changing environment is.

Speaker 2:

That's awesome. So you know, let's go a little bit deeper on. That is when is a good time to start talking to your kids about money?

Speaker 3:

So I think the fun thing about kids is that they one thing kids seem to love to do is play a play parent. Even at those very, very early ages. They want to mimic parents. They want to try to act out whatever they see their parents doing. Kids don't always do what we tell them to do, but they definitely pick up on our mannerisms very quickly and start, for better or worse, acting out those same mannerisms. So just like if you're going shopping and you're pushing a shopping cart little kids love to push their own shopping carts. Or if you're cooking dinner, you can find a child trying to prep their own little meal on a side table or have their own little mini kitchen or whatever it might be. So I think that talking about finance or money matters at a very early age is you can introduce concepts, but introduce it in such a way that it's not a scary thing.

Speaker 3:

I think that's one of the hardest things that we oftentimes think of money as the more complex things like how to invest, how to trade stocks or do things like that, whereas the most critical lessons are actually the fundamentals. It's just kind of like we teach our kids at a very young age how to start brushing their teeth, how to make sure they clean up after themselves, how to make sure they make their bed and things like that. And the reason we do that is to try to instill habits, things that they don't even have to think about, they just kind of do it. And the same can apply to money. If you take a child with you to the grocery store and they can see you paying and how that process works, then when they get a bit older it's not as scary for them to go through that same process. And I think that's one of the hardest parts is we can introduce other concepts to them.

Speaker 3:

But when it comes to introducing the money type concepts, like paying bills and things like that, those are sometimes the things that we put to the sidelines and say you know what? This is something you have to worry about when you're older or think about when you're older, and oftentimes money involves emotion for adults as much as for kids. So I think sometimes we hold off from showing kids things that involve money because it could evoke a positive or sometimes a negative emotion as a parent, like if you have to pay a variety of bills and you're getting frustrated about it. Sometimes you don't want your kids to see that scenario. You don't want them to see that you're struggling and have them think that, oh, there's something bad, there's a negative correlation with money. So sometimes we do it to try to protect our kids. But by doing that it can sometimes cause more harm than good. Yeah well, I can see that.

Speaker 2:

And that really resonated with me, as I think that's part of the reason why some of these conversations don't happen and you alluded to this earlier is that the parents aren't comfortable having the conversations For any number of reasons. They may not feel like they know enough themselves, they may have their own emotions, or history with money, or history with money. So you know, where is it? How can parents start to think about that? You know, to start gaining their own confidence is reading your books, together with the kids.

Speaker 3:

Is that a way for them to build their confidence? So so maybe if I give a little backstory it'll better answer that question. I've written two adult self-help books and six children's picture books, and I started off writing adult self-help books. My first book was called Owning the Dash and it was actually. There's a long story behind it, but Owning the Dash is on your tombstone between your birth and death dates. There's a dash in between and the idea of taking ownership of your life and really trying to seize the opportunities and get the best out of life that you can. But after I wrote my initial self-help book, when I was writing my second book, it was right as COVID was starting, and I had a lot of clients say, ok, the first book was really good for young families. What about those of us trying to make the transition into retirement or have the money last a lifetime and things like that? So I started writing what eventually became the no Regrets Retirement Roadmap, right as COVID was kicking in.

Speaker 3:

And during that time my daughter who is now 15, so about four years back she is one of those young ladies that doesn't sleep at night. Just the mind goes a million miles an hour during the evening hours, and so I would be writing in my home office and then, all of a sudden, I'd look at my side door and there she'd be standing at 10.30 at night and she'd go hi, daddy, just full of energy. And so we started writing next to each other. I would write and she would be writing, and we came up with the idea of writing a children's picture book that taught a financial lesson, and I didn't have any real background in that world. So I sought out a coach and just to learn more about how to write a children's picture books and what are the key things to do and not to do. And one of the biggest lessons that the coach shared with me is that, when it comes to children's picture books, you never want to have the parent telling the child what to do. You always want to show a scenario where it's either siblings or friends or someone as similar age range is experiencing something together and they're learning through that experience. A parent can be showing them something, but not necessarily pushing or trying to teach. Children are really smart. They can tell when a parent is trying to pass a lesson on to them. So the better way for children to learn is not so much for us to just kind of tell them what to do, but for us to introduce scenarios to them and to allow them to make decisions, to allow them to fail.

Speaker 3:

And a lot of times one of the things we teach is that it's okay for kids to fail. The time to fail is in their early years, where they know they're safe, when they know they're not going to be ridiculed or made fun of if they make a mistake or if they do something incorrectly. And I thought that was really, really valuable, because even as adults, I have met with young families and one of the first things when they come to meet with me as a financial advisor would be to say please don't judge us for the decisions we've made. Please don't. I'm so sorry that I did this. And this is the first meeting that they're meeting with a professional and I'm just thinking to myself I have no right to judge you, no matter what. I'm just here to help. I have no right to judge you, no matter what. I'm just here to help. But that instinct of thinking that I'm going to be made fun of or I'm going to be ridiculed, that is not something that they had as an adult. That is something that they instilled at those very early years of life. So, kind of going back to your question, it's the things that you do as a response to the actions of our children that I think are more important than actually telling our children what to do.

Speaker 3:

So introducing concepts in ways. I love the idea behind books because, yes, you can introduce scenarios. You can introduce, just as an example, one of my books is called Rohan and Naira and Big Sister's Bet, and with that book it's actually the book was created as a result of an experience I had with my son. He's now 13, but this happened several years back. We were just in the backyard throwing the football back and forth and I said to him I'll make you a bet. For every catch that we make, I'll give you a quarter and we can keep playing as long as you want to, but if at any point the football drops, you lose all the money and you can decide when we stop. So most parents hearing that that bet, they already know where this is going. They already know that kind of because we've been in that as kids before we started off.

Speaker 3:

We started going back and forth and he was a kid he set a goal for himself. He knew how much he wanted to achieve. But as we kept going and going, we got closer to that goal and he started to think of other things, that he wanted to get bigger things, more expensive things. And we achieved the goal. And he get, you know, bigger things, more expensive things. And we achieved the goal. And he said, you know, let's try for a few more. And so we threw a few more back and forth and then we got up to $18.75. And then I said Are you sure you want to have another throw? And he said yeah, just one more, just one more. And we all know what the one more is right and we all know what the one more is right. One more toss. And I threw it to him and he fumbled the ball.

Speaker 3:

And the reason it became a story, the reason I thought it was so valuable, was in that moment when he fumbled the ball, instead of getting mad at me or or running off or something, he just paused and sat there quietly for a second because he knew it was his decision. He was the one who made the choice to keep playing and he allowed basically greed, or his emotions, to get the better of him and we see this as kids, but we also certainly see this as adults. When it comes to investing and things like that, trying to, maybe, instead of working toward a goal, we just kind of, you know, want to hit what they get rich quick scheme or whatever it might be, what the easy path, and sometimes that path doesn't always work out in our favor. So it was important for him to experience that. But it was also a happy dad moment for me, and I'm not going to say that I there are plenty of moments that I've had my drawbacks or failures as a dad. But in that moment, instead of when he dropped the ball, saying, see, you should have done this, or see the mistake that you're getting on his case, I had said pause and just allowed him to come to me and tell me, you know, say, are you doing okay?

Speaker 3:

Talk about what was going through his mind. So it's those little moments that we have. No money was I mean, money was part of the game, but it was really more so a life lesson that he can apply to other scenarios in his life. So in the book Rohana Naira, it's a brother and sister who go through that experience together. Because, going back to what was recommended. You want to have children not experience something where the parent's doing something, but more so when someone of similar age that they love or trust is going through that experience. So I think it's very easy to talk to kids about things, but it's more important to allow them to talk, to actually allow them to voice their thoughts and kind of experience things and say what's going through their mind, versus us tell them what they should be thinking.

Speaker 2:

Well, and I think that's, you know, pretty much true of anyone. That's an awesome story. I love that story but it makes me, you know, when I was a consultant you know that was always my goals for my clients to have enough information that they would make up their mind and tell me what they wanted to do. You know from an informed choice about from people. You know from other kids, as I know with adults, that it works the same way as their statistics show, like with widows when their husbands pass away, like 80% will go to a new financial planner and usually those are female financial planners. That I think that quite often that's a human instinct is to want to learn from people who are in a similar I don't want to say demographic, that's not quite the right word but a similar situation to them, and I think that can be easier sometimes.

Speaker 3:

Well, I mean yes. I feel that I, over the years, I've been asked what's the number one thing that prevents people from achieving financial success. Is it investments? Is it this, that or the other? And I firmly believe that the number one reason that people don't achieve their goals is fear of failure, fear of judgment. The fact just going back to the example I gave before when they go into a meeting, just even showing up for a meeting, meeting with an advisor is scary enough. Having someone else who's there to look behind the curtain and see what's going on. And this doesn't have to be just with an advisor. This could even be between spouses. Some spouses don't even share what their financial situation is, and it's this kind of fear of I made a bad decision or maybe I don't even know. Sometimes you find individuals that don't want to know how much they owe on this item or that, because it's kind of pulling back the curtain to see the reality of the situation. But in the end, you have to pull it back In order to move forward. You have to assess where things are right now. To pull it back In order to move forward, you have to assess where things are right now. And I would say that if we can overcome that fear of judgment and help people build that confidence really at an early age going back to why I started off with elementary school books, books for kids in grades three through five is because if we can get those habits started early and build that confidence up, that, hey, this is not a scary thing. It's okay to ask questions If you don't know, it's okay to try. It's okay to just not see money as a see it as a tool more than as an obstacle. That can have a very profound effect down the road.

Speaker 3:

And my fifth book called Akash and Mila and the big jump in that book I really try to hone in on that scenario, not so much by talking about money but showing how kids, when they grow up, they try new things, they try a sport. In this case it's two best friends that are trying out for a gymnastics class and they go to the class very excited. One's a little more excited than the other, but they're in there and they're having a demonstration where kids are jumping off of a springboard. I have a son who's in gymnastics, so I have a little passion for that sport. But in this case in the book, the child lands on his face and many adults we can think we can automatically empathize with that scenario.

Speaker 3:

We know those moments where we make the mistake and we're worried that everybody around us in the class is looking at us or we concoct in our minds they're going to be making fun of me. I should get out of here. I don't want to ever try this again, whatever it might be. And in those scenarios, if they do try again and they find they can do it, all of a sudden the confidence levels just go up insurmountably. They wouldn't have tried before. So that if we can help individuals build up that confidence in themselves and in their children, it can be very impactful down the road.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, no, that's awesome. You said a lot there. That was just amazing, you know. I want to go back, and I want to emphasize one thing that you said, though, that it's okay to ask questions. I think that is lost so often is that you know, if our clients aren't asking questions, that is a warning sign that they're not fully engaged, and that we should encourage them to ask questions, because that's how people learn is by asking for information. So, anthony, let's switch up and get into some of the get ready questions. These are a little bit quicker flowing. These are questions I ask every guest.

Speaker 3:

Is first. One is what basic money concept do you wish people knew? The how about what goes into a budget? I think that that is probably the if we can and we can teach kids this, we can teach adults this but if you can figure out how to actually track and manage your finances, that's far more valuable than knowing how to invest a stock or a mutual fund or anything like that. If you can find where it's flowing, then you have control over it. Individuals I've worked with have been individuals that can systematize a lot of where their money flows in and out, can monitor it properly and keep things flexible so that they're not kind of stuck in one approach or another.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I love that. You have to know your numbers, know your resources. Now, that doesn't mean that you have to know it to the penny, because I think sometimes people feel overwhelmed. It's like you have to track everything, but you have to have, I think a general sense of what's going on, so that's awesome advice. The next one is what is one simple thing people can do each year to set themselves up for financial success?

Speaker 3:

I think it's taking the time. It's hard. There's so many things that we all want in life, but the reality is that you just need to set aside a bit of time. It doesn't have to be a substantial period of time, but if it's once a month or even once a quarter, I'd recommend trying once a month.

Speaker 3:

Take an hour where we kind of do an assessment Are we on track for what we said we were going to do? Are we sticking to our goals? We have goals for fitness. We have goals for a variety of things in life. Just add the financial piece in there and if you have a game plan for what you want for the future, it's much easier to track it. I think that's the hard part is that a lot of times people save but they don't know what they're saving, for, how much they're saving or if they're on a track. So the first part is to actually figure out what are the point Bs? What do I need to do to get there and then create some way of making sure you don't forget about it and you stay on top of those two do's?

Speaker 2:

Definitely and that wraps you know your two last responses together is you know you have to know your numbers so you can see if you're on track for goals. But if you're not checking with your own track, it's like what are the goals really for If you don't know whether you're going to hit them or not? They're just random numbers, and I think that's something people struggle with. When they're saving is like you know how much should I put aside for savings? And then you know they're doing their savings at the end of the month instead of doing their savings first, and that goes back to systematizing If you know how much you need to do and you can.

Speaker 3:

It's what I call a top-down approach. So the bottom up is I need to figure out every penny I'm spending and where it's going, and that can drive a lot of people crazy. But if you say this is the income I'm bringing in, these are the things I have to do. People are extremely good at adapting. Somebody can be making a certain level of income and make it work, and they can have a bonus or a promotion and then adapt to whatever that new income is, knowing that they were able to make the other income work. So I think that if you know kind of here's what I need to do to hit this savings goal or save for this particular item, if you can systematize that at the beginning of the month and then know here's what's left, then it becomes a lot easier to track and say if it starts getting. If the checking account starts getting tight, maybe we need to see what's going on, but if it seems pretty steady, then we're living according to the cashflow that we put together.

Speaker 2:

That's awesome. That's great advice. All right Well the next question is what is one habit that people can change when it comes to their money?

Speaker 3:

Um, so money and emotion have a high correlation and it's a high negative correlation. Usually, uh, oftentimes, when we're about to make a decision, uh, when it comes to money based off of emotion, it's usually not in our best interest. Uh, that can be when it comes to investing. That can be comes with purchasing things of that nature. So, if there is a habit, the nice part about money is, uh is it can be systematized. It is something that, yeah, it would be great if I could say my body's automatically going to go to the gym every morning and I'm going to do a good, healthy workout every day. But in the finance world, you can set up authorizations systematically.

Speaker 3:

Pulled out of this that I can remember years back. Pulled out of this that I can remember years back, mark Zuckerberg. They asked him why do you only wear sweatshirts all the time? And he said it's one less decision I have to make during the day. And I thought that was very powerful, because the less we have to think about things, the less, the more we can focus on the things that are priorities in our lives. So we tend to get stressed when there's a lot of puzzle pieces that are floating around all over the place. So the more we can eliminate the things we don't have to worry about and know that they're systematically happening, the easier it is to focus on the goals that make you happy.

Speaker 2:

I love that. I think they said the same thing about Steve Jobs, too, with his wardrobe. Is that same thing? Maybe it's a tech thing.

Speaker 3:

Keep with his wardrobe. Is that it was that same thing? Maybe it's a tech thing.

Speaker 2:

It's simple yeah, right, yeah, there's so many things we need to worry about these days. Exactly so, Anthony. What money myth are you trying to break?

Speaker 3:

I think, for a myth.

Speaker 3:

One of the things that I've seen in this this, my focus is elementary school children, but one thing a lot of parents want to do is start teaching their kids how to trade at a very early age, sometimes when the parents don't even know how to trade themselves, and I think that, that, while it sounds exciting and there's lots of apps that are out there to help make that a reality, I think it's good to, of course, introduce financial lessons, but you have to be very cautious on knowing your child's emotional state.

Speaker 3:

The positive behind apps is they can be used to teach, but the negative is that a lot of apps are built around emotion. So, for example, when someone places a trade, confetti may go down or dings and bells may go off, which create a dopamine response of hey, this is great, this is exciting. You should do this more often, and if a child starts connecting emotion with money and with investing at a very early age, that'll be a hard habit to break. So I think we just need to be more focused on those fundamental lessons in finance and when you do introduce investing, and do it in such a way that you're mindful of how the child is. Emotions are being connected to the decisions that they're making.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I love that because I think, you know, with every other field people start at the beginning and in the money world, people oftentimes start at the middle or even more advanced, like hey, should I buy crypto? Well, you know. Have you set up your budget yet? Well, no. Do you have an emergency fund account? No, or do you have a?

Speaker 3:

credit card that has an 18% limit on it or 18% rate on it. So, yes, it's kind of if you can wipe out those things as kind of the to-dos, I don't want to have any credit card debt before I start trying to invest in the market. Those lessons can really be helpful for down the road.

Speaker 2:

Definitely so. I love that Start with the fundamentals. It works for all kinds of other things. So how can we improve the money conversation? Any thoughts there?

Speaker 3:

So what I would say is that of course, it depends on the age and who you're having the conversation with, but since my target is, in this case, young children having the conversation with them, it goes back to the idea of introducing stories and experiences to a child, and those experiences can be learned through books, but it could also be doing things like doing your bills and having the child see you, and if they ask what that is, you can say so, our electric bill is this amount. And then the child starts to go oh, so that's how much electricity costs, or how much, whatever it might be. I think that those are the and I apologize, is it going to that? What was the question? Again?

Speaker 2:

Oh no, it is just how can we improve the conversation.

Speaker 3:

That's so it goes back to introducing the concepts. And then, when they ask questions, don't judge them, just be there to answer and answer as you'd want someone to answer you.

Speaker 2:

I love that when kids ask questions, don't judge them. I think it's easy to do that and you know that goes back to what you were talking about earlier with clients coming in is you know the clients feel like they're going to be judged. And you know, I know I've had that experience like going to the doctor if I'm carrying a few extra pounds, it's like is the doctor going to say something? Am I in trouble?

Speaker 3:

You know, instead of like our worst critics are ourselves right. We will come up with a variety of different scenarios on what the person is going to think about us, and they might be true. But regardless, if we go in with this positive attitude that this person's here to help or that I can do this, all of a sudden, just it's kind of like a vision board. It sounds like a silly concept at first, but then you start to realize, hey, if I believe I can achieve this, it's far more likely to happen than if I think that these are never going to happen for me.

Speaker 3:

One thing that I've always found is interesting is you hear stories of people who win the lottery and then years later go bankrupt, and a lot of that is psychology. It's that they are not used to having that level of wealth, so they will self-sabotage themselves to go back to what they are used to because that's more comfortable to them. So the more we can have people feel more confident in their abilities to manage money and to feel that I can achieve this. Another great example is some individuals who grow up where their parents always have an auto loan. They think that it's unnatural to not have an auto loan, and sometimes, if you can break those kind of habits or mindsets. It could be a stepping stone to a different type of life.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, boy, speaking of auto loans, I don't know if you saw that thing from Investopedia the average cost to achieve the American dream and it was something like $4.4 million. But one of the biggest ticket items was that the average person over their life will spend almost $900,000 on cars.

Speaker 3:

And we've seen what's happened to cars just in the past 20 years. It's kind of I mean, you can get a base level car or you can get something more. It's maybe the nicest way to say it. It's a lot of money can go into those types of items.

Speaker 2:

So yeah, yeah, and that's an easy place to cut back. So you know. One of the questions start to wrap up is you know we'll get out the time machine for a minute. What advice would you give your?

Speaker 1:

younger self.

Speaker 2:

Let's say, if you were a kid, if you go back in time knowing what you know now about money.

Speaker 3:

So I will say that this would actually tie into the first book that I wrote when I started with my daughter. It's called Dash and Nick in the Jelly Bean Game and it goes back to the marshmallow study. Are you familiar with marshmallow study?

Speaker 3:

It's basically a study from years back where they put children in a room and they said I'll give you a marshmallow, I'm going to step out of the room and I'll be back in a minute. If the marshmallow is still there, I'll give you another marshmallow. And they studied to see which kids could would take the marshmallow or not. And so what they discovered is that there's a lot if the compounding effect when you are young, if you can start that saving process and see how much a compound just saving a little bit per month can make a monstrous difference for down the road. It's hard to see when you're in your teens or 20s or whatever it might be.

Speaker 3:

But there's an old phrase it's not timing the market, it's time in the market. And for those younger individuals, the sooner they can build that foundation for themselves and the confidence to say, hey, I've got my cash reserve, I've got my cash flow in good order, I feel like I can start planning for my future goals, the sooner they start doing that. It's a lot less expensive If they can start saving for that new car so they don't have to pay 8% on an auto loan in the future, all those little things start to add up and make a really big difference for the long-term plan.

Speaker 2:

Well, and so what's the value of starting to save early? How does that help you? What's that concept? I'm looking for it of starting to save early.

Speaker 3:

How does that help you? What's that concept? So, going back to the book itself, in the book we have two kids that start off the day with 10 jelly beans and for every hour they can resist they get five more. And one child wants it's a brother and sister who happen to look just like my kids and one child wants to win. So he takes a plate and puts it on top of his jelly beans so he can't see them. And then money out of sight, out of mind, and as the day passes, his pile grows and grows, whereas his younger sibling she might've been a little bit more impulsive and eats her jelly beans right away. And what we get to see throughout the day is his pile growing while her plate is empty. And if that was a story it'd be a terrible story. But there's a twist that happens at the end, where they work together and both end up winning.

Speaker 3:

But I think that it's a really hard thing to teach kids to delayed gratification, how if you wait, you can have so much more. And I think that the easiest way to introduce those concepts is through storytelling and through examples, where they may not experience it themselves but they can see someone else experiencing it and think of what emotions they have going through their mind as they see that empty plate that the one sibling has. And you know, I'd rather be in that position than the other position. So it's for the young ones it's really about allowing them to experience emotions and thought processes that the sooner we can introduce these concepts to them not necessarily trading and all that, that's a little more complicated, but just basic, delayed gratification and understanding how money works the easier it becomes down the road for them and they start to feel you know, I know why I'm doing something, I know what will happen if I do this and that's pretty exciting stuff, yeah, and I was going to say and using some like jelly beans is something that they can identify with.

Speaker 2:

It's not an abstract thing where they have to think about. Well, I don't know what a widget is or whatever it's like every kid knows what a jelly bean is.

Speaker 3:

So yes, absolutely. And a lot of individuals ask for that book why I didn't use money specifically to talk about a money lesson, and it's for that reason. It's that children don't. They can't earn money at such a young age, so they don't value it, even if they get an allowance. It's kind of like okay, there's this money that's being put here, but I don't fully understand how it works. But they can understand the value of that tasty jelly bean or other things and, yes, candy may not have been the best approach to use for teaching a lesson, but a jelly bean here and there doesn't hurt too much. So, yes, a lot of parents know what their kids' passions are, what their kids' interests are, and it's just trying to find those particular items that they do value and use that as your example item.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, Know how to talk to your audience. Use words that your audience knows. So, Anthony, as we start to wrap up, what is your number one favorite money resource that you go to, whether it's a podcast, book, newsletter app or website?

Speaker 3:

Favorite resource. I mean, obviously it depends on the grouping In the world For yourself.

Speaker 2:

Oh for me as an individual.

Speaker 3:

So well for me, I as a financial planner and being in that world, I find that I mean there are a variety of different designations that are out there and over the years I found that many of those designations have been instrumental in teaching.

Speaker 3:

Maybe not the full piece, but there are nuggets that you get out of everything and there are bits of information that becoming a CFP, becoming a CHFC. There's a designation called BFA, which stands for Behavioral Financial Analyst, which talks about the emotion and money that was incredibly helpful. And there's one called RICP, retirement Income Certified Professional that I found was just very helpful in helping individuals prepare for that transition into the next stage or the retirement years of life. A lot of times those designations, yes, they look nice behind a name, but there is a lot of knowledge and expertise that goes into bringing them and they just introduce concepts that you may not get in the everyday world. So I find that, at least in the financial services world, that they are very helpful to have and good things to look for if you're looking to hire somebody.

Speaker 2:

Definitely yeah, and I think that's powerful. Advice is you know the designations. You know sometimes they don't mean as much, but there are a lot of designations, like you're talking about certified financial planner, that there's a lot behind it. And if you're not sure if a designation brings power to your advisor or means anything is, go to the designations website and if it's a worthwhile designation, it will tell you what goes into it. And then the CFP is not an easy destination to get.

Speaker 3:

And it just shows they also have an interest as well, that they want to learn more. And if someone doesn't have it, it doesn't mean that they don't, but at least as a it's hard to tell you. When you work with a financial planner, you're trying to determine a trust and a confidence level, and sometimes things like that can be just another added piece to give you that. And, as you said, there's lots of different designations. So do your research and find out which ones do have a bit more merit than others. But if someone has them, it shows that they do have a passion towards that particular field of study.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and I know I have a CLU chartered life underwriter and for me that's table stakes if you're in the insurance business.

Speaker 2:

So I think yeah for consumers and for their advisors. When you're working with other advisors and trying to decide, you know like, do I want to refer business to another advisor? I don't know. Well, as you know, that's also something you can use as the guideline. You know, like you said, there's a new designation, ricp Retirement Income Professional and so that's an important one. You know, not something that somebody 20 years old is going to need an RICP.

Speaker 3:

So yeah, yeah, there's a lot of information and I think that's probably one of the hardest parts for a lot of people trying to sift through it all, and I think that's probably one of the hardest parts for a lot of people trying to sift through it all. And I think podcasts like yours are a great, an incredible tool to get nuggets Once again, little pieces that hey, this does make sense that relate. I can understand that mindset. So knowledge is power and if you find a trusted source, hold onto it.

Speaker 2:

That's exactly it. So, to wrap up, anthony, what is your number one?

Speaker 3:

tip on changing the way we think about money. Don't judge yourself and don't judge others. I mean, as corny as that might sound, it's the more that we can just realize that we're all going through this crazy world together. We're all trying to figure it out. Different people will be at different stages. There will always be somebody better than you, always somebody worse than you.

Speaker 3:

I'll share my last little thought process that always hits me is if you had the choice I think that Warren Buffett or someone stated this a little while back.

Speaker 3:

If you had, if your life was a ping pong ball and you could throw that ping pong ball into a giant pool full of ping pong balls for everybody else in the world, and then you get to pull someone else out at random, would you do it? And I've yet to meet someone who says yes, because then they start to think about oh, there's a lot of people that are in much worse position than I am, and when we only look at ourselves, we sometimes think, oh, I'm messing up or I'm behind or I'm not where I should be. But the reality is that sometimes, with some minor tweaks, you can really get yourself propelled to that next level and you're probably in a much better position than you think. So if you can have that confidence fear of judgment going back to what I said earlier if you can not judge yourself, that will be a huge step towards um achieving whatever dreams you have.

Speaker 2:

That's awesome. That's fantastic advice. To close out on, so Anthony, where can people find out more about you? Where can they pick up your books? I know you have a cup. Uh, have one of your books handy there.

Speaker 3:

I do so I mean Dash and Nikki, and the Jellybean Game is the first one that's out. They are available in hardcover, softcover, ebook formats. The best place to go is my website. It's owningthedashcom O-W-N-I-N-G-T-H-E-D-A-S-Hcom owning the dash. Books are also available on Amazon and Barnes, Noble and where books are sold. But on the website, in addition to the books, there are also free resources for parents and teachers, where we have discussion questions that you can use. We actually have games and activity books, so lots of fun things to help not only read the book but have ways to introduce some of these concepts in a more fun and engaging way with the kids.

Speaker 2:

Awesome, awesome. And, as always for everyone watching and listening, there will be links to Anthony's books and website in the show notes so you can get in touch with him and pick up a copy of his book. So Anthony thanks again for joining us today on the Get Ready Money podcast.

Speaker 3:

Thank you so much for having me. It's been wonderful.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, this is awesome. Appreciate your time and your insights and everyone. I thank you, as always, for tuning in to this episode of the Get Ready Money podcast. If you learned something today to change the way you think about money, please be sure to subscribe and to tell a friend. Until next time let's change the way we think about money. Thanks for watching.

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Tony Steuer

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