Life Conversations with a Twist
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Life Conversations with a Twist
Money Without Fear: How Small Steps Lead to Financial Empowerment with Lacy Garcia
“The only way you're going to be able to grow wealth and get ahead is to start to do that today.” —Lacy Garcia
Money stress does not get quieter, it compounds— late bills, confusing advice, and life changes make it louder. But this does not mean you failed; it means you need a clearer map. Small, practical moves paid consistently will change your life more than one sweeping overhaul.
Lacy Garcia turned a difficult personal money moment into Willow, a wealth-tech platform that matches people with financial advisors trained to work with women and next gen investors. Her core insight is simple: make finance nonjudgmental, break it into baby steps, and get the human help that fits your life.
Check this episode and get practical tips on tiny daily money moves, how Willow matches you with the right financial advisors, the basics of wealthtech, side-hustle and small-business money tips, and concrete next steps for divorce, career gaps, parenting and retirement planning.
Connect with Heather:
Episode Highlights:
02:02 Meet Lacy and More About Willow
09:52 Financial Education and Mistakes
20:17 Willow’s Services and Matchmaking Process
31:13 The Need for Better Financial Education
37:30 Transitioning to Financial Independence
44:47 The Importance of Financial Awareness and Where to Get Help
Resources:
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Connect with Lacy:
Lacy Garcia is the Co-Founder and CEO of Willow, a purpose-driven fintech company revolutionizing financial empowerment for underserved communities. Her work focuses on making financial planning accessible, especially during life’s major transitions such as marriage, divorce, and entrepreneurship. A recognized industry voice, Lacy blends personal experience with strategic insight to challenge the “male, stale, and scary” norms of traditional finance. She is a passionate advocate for inclusive fintech, women in leadership, and shame-free financial wellness.
Heather Nelson: Excited to have this conversation. Like I said, all these conversations always come at a perfect time in my life, so I'm really excited for this.
Welcome everyone to this week's Life Conversations With A Twist. I am honored to have Lacy Garcia. Lacy Garcia, her and I just met. Like most podcasters, we get reached out to by all these amazing women who are doing such great things in our community, women empowerment and all the things. And I really think the work that you're doing very much aligns with what my podcast listeners are all about. Especially for the work that I'm doing too, so I'm super excited to have this conversation. So welcome.
Lacy Garcia: Well, Heather, I am thrilled to be here with you. I love what you're doing and the conversations that you're having. And it's really exciting to be here with you and your audience to have this conversation today. And it's really awesome too that we are speaking for the first time. Lots of great things come out of it. I have a feeling, oh, my gosh.
Heather Nelson: Before we hit record, I feel like all my guests always come on at a certain perfect time in my life, or even just the day of the life when you're struggling with something. And a lot of what we're going to talk about today is finances. And I, of course, woke up in the middle of night freaking out about finances, so I think this will be a great conversation for myself, but also for the listeners. So tell the listeners a little bit about who you are? Where do you live? A little bit about what you're doing. And then we're going to just dive right into the nitty gritty.
Lacy Garcia: I would say, I am a mother first, but I spend so much of my time. I'm also a very passionate entrepreneur and a financial wellness expert. I guess you too would say, and so I'm really blessed. I feel like I'm very fortunate that life has given me some really incredible experience and expertise, but also thrown some real twists at me. Quite a few twists at me. What I'm doing today is talking about trustwillow.com, which is a company I started six years ago, which is a financial technology platform. We'll get into that in a little bit what exactly that means. But it was based on my own experience. I was a woman who was really well educated, driven from a career standpoint, but just did not think that I had to be responsible for my finances. And I think that I was not alone. In fact, I'm in that Zenial generation. But a lot of the older women, that's how we were raised, right? And frankly, what I'm so thrilled about is that taboo and the thinking that you shouldn't be in control of your finances is, for women at least, is going out the window with the younger generations, and that they're taking so much more control earlier on.
But one of the things I'm super passionate about what we're doing at Willow is we actually are training and vetting financial advisors, and then introducing them, kind of matchmaking them with individuals, families who come and take our questionnaire based around not just what your gender is, what your financial needs, and what your financial needs are, how much money you have? But also, what are you really looking for in a personalized trusted advisor? How can we ensure that you find somebody who doesn't just have the financial expertise is a fiduciary, but is also someone that's going to have a similar kind of life story, hobbies, passions, in a way that you can connect with them? Because the reality is that finances are incredibly emotional. I believe that they are your overall health and wellness. Finances are very much foundational to that. As you said, keeping you up at night. It keeps more than the majority of Americans. Finances are one of the main things that keep us up at night. So one of the things we're helping people to do is that you can take control. If you feel totally overwhelmed, there are small steps you can take that will help you to get to a better place, or get to the place where you're achieving all of your goals from a financial perspective.
Heather Nelson: So good. I cannot wait to have this conversation. You said you are a Mom. How many kids? How old are they?
Lacy Garcia: I have an 11 year old son who is my world. I actually always thought I'd be somebody who had a bunch of kids. And instead, when he was three, I got divorced. That was one of those twists, those unexpected twists. That was also at the time where I went from having given up control of my finances. But then unexpectedly becoming not just the main contributor, but then the sole provider. And then found myself, whoa, I have to clean up this whole situation to take real control. Single mom with a very young child, and so I ended up not having more children. But I happily joke with people that I have lots of nieces and nephews, and God children. I'm the type of person that when I say, you can drop them off in my house. I'm not even kidding, because I am one of those people. I think it is how single parents are. There's the pros and the cons, but we do have a moment to breathe a little bit more. When you have an only child, sorry, not single parents. I know single parents, the overwhelming majority of the time. But sometimes with only children, you did get a little bit of a moment to breathe every once in a while.
Heather Nelson: I know one of my girlfriends was joking around the other day. She's like, sometimes, I just wish me and my husband were divorced, or just had a divorce schedule. We only had our kids every other week, so we got the time. And I was like, yes, that's how me and my husband were when we first got together, my second husband. My two older kids obviously went to their dad, and then we were single every other week, and it was fantastic. And then we had four. He is now four, but we totally started over with a baby. And I'm like, now we have no time for each other.
Lacy Garcia: I think that there's a lesson in there, right? I think it's an important message for women, for mothers. You need to take a minute for yourself to breathe. Because when you're just on 100% of the time, and you're juggling work, and you're juggling your relationship, or if you're single parenting, it's just crazy regardless of whether or not you get the weekend off, which doesn't always end up. You get the weekend off, you're still there at the game, or help me with the forgotten stuff, or whatever it may be. But you do have to find how to carve out some time so that you can take a breath. You can put that oxygen mask on yourself. Because I think one of the positive things we're seeing now through a successful co parenting relationship is that parents are actually getting that chance to breathe. They're able to do more for their kids in that moment that they have them where they really allotted that time. And so I think that that's actually something. But it's also something for every full time parent because you're still a full time parent even if you don't have your kids. But if you really physically have them all the time, you still have to make sure that you can get just a few minutes to breathe so you can take care of yourself, and then be more present with them.
Heather Nelson: So true. When you were growing up, were you always in the finances? I feel like you're either a money person or not. .Or you're in the numbers, or you're not. What was growing up for you? Did you always know you were going to be in finance? How did you even get down that path? Most of the time, it's usually that way.
Lacy Garcia: The complete opposite. In fact, I was a very good student, and math was like the bane of my existence. I struggled with math as early as elementary and high school. I went off to college and I was like, I'm going to be an Econ major. I did it in my first semester. That didn't go so well. I was first a teacher. I was an educator. I was in the nonprofit sector, and then I was really a marketer. I was very far away from the numbers, very far away from finance. Did not, in any way, shape or form, expect to get here. So therefore, I can say with total confidence that if you're not a math person, or you feel like you're not good at this, or doesn't come naturally to you, you can learn it. It's probably something that's translated well because I am coming from it, not from somebody who just lives, eats, breathes, and thinks in numbers. I'm like the opposite. I'm like, I don't understand this. How can we break it down and make it relatable and understandable? It was a very much of a lived experience of waking up and effectively not being in a good place financially, and really needing to figure everything out. And at the same time, I went from a marketing person to really making this transition into becoming a financial advisor at the same time. And it was like, wow. On both fronts, I was like, I'm counseling clients, and I need to also have all the answers for myself. So it was a little bit of drinking from the fire hose for me, but that's one of the reasons why I'm so passionate about making it simple. And what we're doing at Willow is trying to make it as relatable and simple, and as easy as possible. Because we know how scary and overwhelming, and just really frightening it can be.
Heather Nelson: Did you start this path pre divorce, or after divorce? Or was it the divorce that was kind of that moment where you're like, okay, great. Now, I've got to figure this out.
Lacy Garcia: I had gotten into the financial sector pre divorce. While I was still married, I went from the head of marketing to becoming a financial advisor to better support my family. But starting Willow, what I went through was the catalyst because I wanted to make, in some ways, it's like making lemonade out of lemons, and also not wanting other women, and other people in general, just to suffer the way that I did because of all the mistakes I made, and the things that I didn't know, that I wish I knew then. So that's part of what I'm really trying to help to demystify, and hopefully save a few folks some of the twists that you can maybe get ahead of control a little bit more than I did in my own experience.
Heather Nelson: If you're somebody that's listening to this, you're not in a great financial spot, or you made a bad decision, is there hope that you can come out on the other side in a better place? I think people get stuck. They're like, oh, my gosh, I made this big mistake. I'm going to be financially horrible forever. Or whatever their mindset might be around that. But it sounds like you and your company really put hope into people to figure it out.
Lacy Garcia: 100%. I think with your financial picture, it's like any other situation in life when we think about weight loss, right? If you're thinking about quitting smoking, drinking or whatever, it all starts with the baby steps. One day at a time. And if you found yourself in a tricky or difficult financial position, there are certainly things that your actions can take today to help to improve that situation, and things that you can learn. And, quite frankly, you can map out a path and get yourself out of that challenging situation, and actually get yourself into a strong position down the road. So yeah, I believe that very strongly.
Heather Nelson: Do you think the biggest mistake that we make as women is, I know that this is a very loaded question. Is there one thing that you're seeing or constantly showing up for people that they're doing wrong, or things that you wish you could be like, just start here. What's your advice around that?
Lacy Garcia: Part of it is just failure to start. I think a lot of times, we don't want to deal with it. We're feeling scared, overwhelmed or ashamed, and we separate it. We're like, oh, I'll get to that next week. Or I'll get to that next month. And the reality is you got to take care of it today. Take that medicine today. So I think that that's something like I've seen firsthand with people who've gotten into debt, for instance. I'll have conversations and be like, okay, you got to call that credit card company right now. You've got to ask to renegotiate your interest rate, or say you're going to close down. If you call them and have that conversation, good chances are you can get some of the debt reduced. You can get that interest rate reduced. But if you just leave it and only pay the minimum, or don't pay it, then your credit is going to continue to get worse. The debt you owe is just going to continue to get higher. So that's the type of example. Sometimes, we just put things off. And putting things off because we can't deal ends up putting us in a more difficult situation, or thinking that we don't deserve, or we're not ready for help.
The other thing is, I think that there's a lot of misunderstanding or a myth out there that you have a lot of money, and you have to be in a great place to work with a financial advisor. And frankly, yes. There are definitely advisors who are amazing. When you're inheriting big sums of money or selling your business, everything is really strong and positive from a financial perspective. But there are also people, financial advisors and professionals, who are there to help if you're on the opposite end of the spectrum. And certainly everywhere in between. So I think one of the things too is not asking for help. So either putting it off or not asking for help. Help are the two main things that I see, both of them, I think those are the small steps. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. If you're already feeling like you're in a bad place, could it really get worse? Just because you pick up the phone and call that credit card company, or you reach out, for instance, it doesn't have to be trustwillow.com, but you go to another free service and try to schedule a call with a financial professional, free call, so that you can at least start to get to see what type of assistance and help you could possibly get.
Heather Nelson: It's so funny that you say that because I remember, I've always been in charge of the finances even in my last marriage. Any going forward to where I am now, I'm the only one that even knows what's going on. My husband could never log in and figure out anything, which is not a good thing. But I definitely control the money. But I remember, there was a point where I was in a networking group and I met some financial advisors. They're like just jumping on a call. And when I would tell people like, oh, I have a financial advisor. They're like, isn't that so expensive? And I was like, no, they're not actually.
Lacy Garcia: The amount of money they're saving or they're growing for you, it's actually like, no.
Heather Nelson: It was one of the best things that we ever did, at least for our 401k and understanding that world. But for people who are so scared of it, or afraid of it, or there's a lot of unknown about it, I highly recommend it because I think just to see the overall scope and everything you have going on, and to help you make the best decisions was one of the best decisions I ever made.
Lacy Garcia: Well, that is Heather. I think that's so true. I was like, you said it perfectly. I also think that it's great in many ways. That there are now all these influencers, and people are openly talking more about finance and giving money tips, and financial tips online. A lot of them are great. Giving some really useful tips, like me sitting here today and talking, giving some useful tips. But that said, they don't have an understanding of your individual situation, which is what's really important, and why you really should have a one on one conversation with a financial advisor, financial professional who's actually able to understand what it really looks like. Because they can't give you the right advice if they don't actually know what your unique situation is. What are your priorities? What are your goals? What type of debt? Out there, somebody's speaking to many people, and they might be giving you some advice. Go do this. But actually, that's really not a good idea for you. If they knew what your financial situation really looked like, what type of debt you had, or how much money you really had in the bank or in which investment accounts, I think it's really important that you know that. I'm not pushing, you got to find the right fit too. It's got to feel right to you. So that's where I'm like, hey, shop around. We go a bare minimum, we go once a year to the doctor for a physical, right?
You should be getting a checkup on your finances at least once a year. That's one of the things we're trying to help to do with Willow. Try to make sure that you can find someone that you feel like you can connect with, that you don't feel like it doesn't get you, or speaks down to you. It was supposed to be a positive experience. Some have negative experiences, which we know can happen. I certainly have had that happen to me when I was seeking and looking for advisors in the past, so I can relate to that. But I think it's really important that we all give ourselves that gift of doing that checkup on our finances. First, by being aware of what we have. Don't put it off. Open your eyes and take a look. Review that credit card bill. Look at those balances. Figure out what exactly it is you're dealing with. But also, give yourself the gift of getting some advice from a trusted financial fiduciary who can really help you to navigate, because there's so many different vehicles, tools and things that we don't even know exist these days that are there to help you.
Heather Nelson: Good. You keep talking about Willow. What is Willow? How did Willow come about? I have so many questions about it. How did Willow develop?
Lacy Garcia: Yeah. So Willow was developed now with some great team, I'll say some great co founders and investors. Really hard working people over the years. We were very passionate. I was very passionate about helping to solve this problem, really, for women, for millennials, for Gen Z, for women younger, and also members of underrepresented groups. I'm Cuban, American. I feel like I can't find the right financial advisor. I feel like when I go and have a conversation, they don't get me. They gloze over me. They look at my husband, whereas I'm the breadwinner. All the things right that we hear about that, we think we wish it didn't happen, but they really do happen. So anyway, what we did was we assembled this awesome team and figured out like, okay, how do we solve this problem? For the individual, the client, the investor, the consumer, what's the best way to do that?
So for starters, we want to make sure that they can get access for free to financial advisors who are trained, who are vetted, who we know that will be aware of any of the challenges, concerns, issues, mindset that these clients are bringing into the table? We created the advisor for women and the advisor for next gen certificate programs. And basically, their advisor education and training programs where we make sure, first of all, only work with advisors who we believe have the passion, and we call it the 3e at Willow. It is really critical to the success of an advisor client relationship is empathy and education that will empower your client. We make sure that somebody who's going to have those has the right type of education and experience. We also help to train them, and to make sure that they have a real understanding of the different kinds of investment priorities, or life transitions and challenges. If you're somebody who's going through a divorce, or somebody who's recently widowed, if you're in the sandwich generation or whatever it may be, we try to make sure that they are equipped and ready to be that empathetic coach, that trusted advisor. And to not just help you with your finances, but do it in a way that really is from a financial life perspective.
Heather Nelson: The employees of you, do they only work for Willow? Or are they individual financial advisors that are able to be a part of this program?
Lacy Garcia: No, they do not work for Willow. They take our certificate program. We work in partnership with them. And through the certificate program and earning their certificate, they're able to join our network. But no, they are actually coming from a wide range of small to larger firms, which allows for a lot more diversity where they are bringing in different perspectives. And they're coming from all around the country. I think that that's important. We're working with a wide range of different firms, a wide range of different advisors.
Heather Nelson: And I love that you're able to help the consumer be matched to that perfect person. So if somebody's wanting to invest in the stock market and learn more about that world, I'm sure you have advisors that are just more educated around that, or they feel like a little bit on that. And I love that it's not one size fits all. It's really a unique experience getting matched.
Lacy Garcia: Completely. So that's where we have a range. We want to make sure that everybody gets to the right place, to someone who has the right experience and expertise for them and meets them where they're at in their life. I will say, there are some really great services. People are listening. People who are in terrible debt, there are some really amazing services out there that are free, kind of budget buddies from a coaching perspective. There's a lot of nonprofits. And there's Savvy Ladies, if you know about Savvy Ladies. There's all these awesome kinds of resources, right? And then there's really a lot of advisors who are really focused, if you've got a couple million dollars and above. And then there's this range in between. We kind of focus on that. Call it like the mass affluent. The range in between where you have some debt, you've got some money, you're growing, you're trying to grow your wealth, you're trying to make sure that you can afford the things you want to afford. But who really specializes in helping you to get where you're trying to get to? And so that's where we see the area of the greatest need, and where we're focused on bringing in a range of advisors who can really help.
Heather Nelson: What a definition of Fintech is.
Lacy Garcia: Fintech was a short term that's short for Financial Technology. I was like, there's so many acronyms. There's so many out there. And financial technology is basically a technology firm that's helping with anything that's in the financial world. And actually within Fintech, there's something called Wealthtech. That's actually any financial technology company that's focused around wealth management. Willow is technically a wealth technology platform where our technology system is helping people. What that means is, from a consumer perspective, you come to us, we have you fill out our survey, and then you're going to get matched, and can be communicated through our online experience. So we're a financial technology company. Because when you get to the advisor, we match you with the advisor, and then you're having a conversation, right? Then you're getting the direct service, that personal contact. The role that Willow is playing in between is we're using technology to create that curated matchmaking process to get you to that person at the end.
Heather Nelson: Which is so cool, because I'm assuming that you probably work with your financial advisors, and your clients are all over the world.
Lacy Garcia: Well, we're in the US because of the financial regulations. We focus on the US because we have to be licensed and regulate it.
Heather Nelson: The US is enough to manage on its own. Because I feel like sometimes, people think that you have to have a financial advisor around your area. There are some great ones, and I'm sure you know. But if there's one that doesn't really, again, fit you or fit your needs very well, then you feel like, well, I don't have that connection. Or now, I just don't have one at all.
Lacy Garcia: Heather, I say that we see a lot of people who are coming to us, a lot of women and the younger folks who are coming to find an advisor don't necessarily even want to have to meet in person. They're looking for somebody who's able to meet them where they're at in their life. If they're running a business, with a baby. And as long as that financial advisor is knowledgeable and licensed, right in your state, then it matters less today where they are based. If you're in California, you could be working with somebody who's in Chicago. Or you might really want to meet with somebody locally. But we're seeing more and more busy women and more younger folks actually would rather do a lot of these communications and conversations via video, via text, via phone call. And then that way, it opens up not just from like, oh, here are the people who are in my area who would be available. But actually, I can connect with this person who actually totally gets and understands me. Maybe they're not based in my same state, but they're licensed and knowledgeable about my state, and they can provide me financial advice there. So we feel like it actually opens up that opportunity to find a better connection. If you are open to meeting with someone virtually, we also can facilitate. We're not necessarily in every state, but we have connected people who can meet in person. But I think we're seeing the growing trend that people are less wanting to meet in person, and they're wanting to do a lot of this virtually.
Heather Nelson: Do you mostly focus on women?
Lacy Garcia: We started to focus around women, and we've grown it to millennial and Gen Z, within that range. We definitely have men coming to us as well. But I would say that one of the things that's important is that we start with the woman versus the rest of the industry. We started with a full understanding, respect and empowerment of the woman. It doesn't mean that we don't love working with couples, and it doesn't mean that we can't work with men who also respect women. But that's where we started, and that's our core competency, which is different from the majority of the financial service.
Heather Nelson: I love it. Men that want to be on the podcast, I'm like, I'm sorry, I only have women. Oh, I feel so bad. But I like it, but that's just what my niche is.
Lacy Garcia: 100%. Well, that's the thing. There's a real shortage. In fact, it's really hard to find firms and advisors a lot of the times that really understand and are all about empowering women. So that's one of the reasons why we're doing what we're doing is to change that, and to make sure that women can easily find that.
Heather Nelson: I'm assuming you help, obviously, people with their personal finances. But do you also help them if they're business owners as well?
Lacy Garcia: Yeah, that's a really important one. We work with a lot of entrepreneurs, and it's certainly somebody who's an entrepreneur. I think it's also really important that you learn how to keep those separate. But a lot of times, that's really challenging, and that's a big challenge. We do work with a lot of business owners. More on women, especially who are starting businesses or have side hustles. It's really critically important. When you're juggling both, I think it becomes even more important that you need to make sure that you've got some trusted financial advice that you can rely on.
Heather Nelson: It's definitely scary. I feel like as a business owner, there's so much to know. Or there's so many great ways of doing it. There's wrong ways of doing it, and it can be a scary, lonely place. And of course, you have your CPAs and things like that. But sometimes, they're only focused on the tax part of it. And I like it, but I want to know overall. Am I good? Am I doing things the right way? I would love to not pay as many taxes, how do I get there? What is a piece of advice you have? Because you keep talking about millennials, and you obviously are helping the younger generation, kind of educating them around finances, money and things like that. What is the number one, or maybe a couple pieces of advice you give to somebody who is, maybe they're starting to work now, and some of the things that they could put into place to help them be a little bit in a better place later in life?
Lacy Garcia: Well, I think what's really important is to start with your paycheck. Let's think about your paycheck. Couple things, if you are working for someone who has provided a 401k and there's any sort of 401k match, don't think, because I even did this. I was like, oh, I'm not going to put in that much money, because I want to have more spending money. That's free money, right? Definitely take advantage of your retirement account. And before the money actually hits your paycheck, I would also recommend making sure that some of it is going into an account for some savings, and some is also going to an account for you to save up enough to have investments. Or it could be one account. You sort of automatically set these things up so that if you're getting a direct deposit, the money doesn't even hit your bank account. So instead of being like, I'm so excited. I have $1,000 to spend. Oh, I'm so excited, I have $900 to spend. Honestly, the only way that you're going to be able to really grow wealth and get ahead is to start to do that today. I think one of the most important things is to make sure, because this money compounds, right?
The money that goes into retirement today, you look at how 20, 30, 40, 50 years, you put a little bit in consistently, you'll be able to live off that when you're older. And if you put a little bit of money instead, maybe one night less out a week, or make your own coffee instead of buying it out, or whatever it is that feels hard at the time, but if you put that money into, first of all, make sure that you get that cash cushion. Because today's uncertain world, all the twists come. Companies are laying off employees. You have to be prepared for that unexpected situation. But once you have that cash cushion, you have a little bit more. You can start investing it, and you can start to grow that money. I think that those are my best pieces of advice. It's kind of in your head. You might look at your paycheck, or here I am making this much money, and this much money is coming to my account. I would just like to subtract a little bit from that and put some of that money to work for me. Because if you put a little bit of that money to work for you, that's how you're going to start to really be able to actually grow wealth, and ensure that you're going to be able to take care of yourself in your retirement. Buy that home first, go on those dream vacations, whatever it is that's off in the future that you really want to achieve.
Heather Nelson: I wish that growing up, they talked about it more. I remember, I want to say it was high school, there was like a month of financial education. It was more like how to write a check. No one's writing checks anymore. I wish that they told us that. There was a class when we were in high school and we're about to get jobs, and have the income coming in to do that, because I never had that.
Lacy Garcia: Clearly, neither did I.
Heather Nelson: We're all struggling to get it now,
Lacy Garcia: I was very firmly in middle age when I started to take control. It's never too late, so don't feel discouraged or frustrated because there's definitely steps that you can take today to help to get yourself to a better spot. For sure.
Heather Nelson: It feels reassuring to hear that. What if somebody was interested, if they're listening to this and they're like, okay, Willow sounds on my alley. I would love to find a financial advisor that's right for me. What are the steps, and how can they work with you?
Lacy Garcia: You go to trustwillow.com, there'll be like a button to click to get matched, and you take our survey. And that way, you'll actually get matched with three different options of advisors based upon your information. We'll ask you a lot of questions. It doesn't take that long. It's like less than 30 questions. We're trying to get to know you, and trying to make sure that we bring the folks who are going to be the best fit for you. If you end up in that first group and you see them and they don't look right, you can always go ahead and get rematched. Like I said, it all comes through the platform. There's emails, and there's tools, tips, and all these things that will be there to help you out. It's a free service. We're really a mission driven company, and we want to make sure that anybody who's looking for that help, who that trusted financial advice, particularly women and younger folks can come to a place where they don't have to spend money on that process, and they can get some help and guidance to get to some really good potential options.
Heather Nelson: I love that. I'm very much happy that you and I have met because I'm like, okay, I need to go apply again. I have some but they're looking at every single part of my businesses. I have two businesses, and all of them are 401k accounts that we have, so it would be great to have someone look at it holistically as a whole. But one of the things that I was looking over, what you really help people with, and it's a lot of the transition, like if they are having a life transition. And one of the things that comes to mind the most for me, or I hear the most, is women who either have been stay at home moms, their whole baby's career, or since they've had babies, their husbands go to work and they don't have the income coming in for themselves, and they either want to go back to work, or maybe they want to leave their husband, and they don't know how to do that. What advice, or what steps could they take if they're in a transition like that, for them to help get some inspiration and some tools to be able to overcome that?
Lacy Garcia: It's getting to be a better and better environment today. There's the upsides, there's the downsides. But one of the upsides of what's happening with social media is content creation. You can turn whatever it is you're passionate about. It could be a dog walking right into a side hustle, right? From the comfort of your own home, like at night when everyone's asleep, or get a business up and running. I was just getting served an ad right before I got on this about, you could create a digital image that you sell for $17 blah, blah, blah. We're all getting these ads and inundated with them. And I'm not saying to not evaluate and look at them, and face value, but there's some truth in here. There's some definite truth in here. I think one of the things that's really encouraging today is that there is this, what used to be the gig economy, what used to be non-mainstream has become more and more mainstream. All the tax advantages to having Airbnb. There's a lot of things that you can do that are not within that traditional work path today that actually are a low barrier to entry. You can get them going on right away. You can figure out really quickly whether or not people want to buy it or not. There's a lot of tools online, coaching classes, assistants to help you get up and running with those things. So it's a lot more accessible, right?
It's not like this path towards, all of a sudden, oh, my goodness. If you were a stay at home mom and you're responsible for child care, and you really want to go back to work, there's only the traditional path where you have to figure out child care for your children. That doesn't exist anymore, right? Or it still exists, for sure, but there are other paths which I think are really encouraging. I think my mom actually did tell me this, and I wasn't listening as much as I should. My parents have been very helpful, I will say. She was always like, you want to keep something for yourself even if you're a stay at home mom. We know how much you see that all the time. Or there are more and more stay at home dads, by the way. Or stay home partners, whoever it might be that they should be earning like almost $200,000 a year for the work that they're contributing. So that's really true. But at the same time, make sure that you've got some of your own money. So however you do that, right? Think about the side hustle. Think about having your own tutoring or coaching, or dog walking, or marketing business, whatever it is that's going to help you to have access to your own money. Money really can provide opportunity and unlock the key to freedom, or transition, or movement so that you don't have to stay in a relationship that's no longer serving you. I know we're living in these uncertain times, but if you look back at the women in the 50s and the 60s, they didn't have an out. And it might feel like you have nothing, but there are a lot more options today. There's a lot more options, so I encourage you to really take a look, think about it, because there's probably something that you can figure out how to do that could be the path towards 10 times more success than a traditional career path.
Heather Nelson: It's wild to me to see some of the success stories around people just having a little side hustle, or posting Amazon reviews, or doing these things. I'm like, wow. It's insane to me.
Lacy Garcia: This is the thing. It's like this whole new gig economy. There's all these ways that you can quickly follow what other people are doing, and get access to an income stream. I think it's a real opportunity, and it's really open. It's changed the answer to this question in a fundamentally different way.
Heather Nelson: And it's wild. My mommy group of friends always talk about it, how we all work from home, or we have our own businesses. How we're able to just go pick up our kid if they're sick at school. Or picking them up to their minimum days, and then they have sports after school, or all these extra things. I'm like, how would we be able to do that if we're working 8 to 5 in an office? I feel so much of that has shifted now, and allows us to do more things from home.
Lacy Garcia: Yeah. The other thing too is, if you are looking to go back to a more traditional career path, I had a girlfriend who had an awesome career. She has been home, I think, for the last eight years with her three kids. And she's like, can't believe I'm going back. And she was like, I've been so in my head about it, so nervous, so worried and so this. And she's like, I just started talking to people, and you know what? I realized, they're so excited to get me back, because they realize I've been running a house, and I can get stuff done. I think that people completely respect and understand career breaks. And also realize that staying home, managing a household and all these other things, put them on your resume. I think that's one of the things too. I've seen a couple of resumes. I would say, put it on your resume what have you been doing. Managing the household budget, doing X, Y, Z. The reality is, like, it's not like you have been just sipping pina coladas. I highly doubt that's the case. Tell people what you've been doing because those skills are really transferable. Especially in this world where so many were working virtually, or it's a hybrid work environment. You're able to work in a virtual or a hybrid work environment. And the other thing too is women are driving so much of consumer purchasing power. We see what's happening in the financial world, the wealth transfer that's happening that women are going to control as much as $34 trillion with wealth just by 2030 in the US alone. There's $16 trillion that's currently moving over. So the reality is having these skills and that experience puts you in touch with the number one consumer for most of these companies and their target client. So I wouldn't underestimate those. I would certainly play them up.
Heather Nelson: So good. I have loved this conversation so much. I'm inspired by my own world. Is there anything that we didn't talk about that you want to talk about, or that you want to leave the listeners with?
Lacy Garcia: I think we've talked about so much. It's been such a great conversation. I think I'd reiterate one of the things. Whether you're feeling excited and things are going really well, and you want to figure out how to make sure that you're growing your wealth the right way, or if you're sitting on the other end of the conversation and you're stressed and overwhelmed, I think the first thing is to come with awareness. Being aware of where you are. Give yourself the gift of taking a couple of minutes to just think through where you are from a financial standpoint, doing an inventory, figuring out how much money you're spending, how much money is coming in, and how much money is going out. Don't judge yourself. Just have an honest heart to heart with yourself, and then give yourself the gift of asking for help. And by the way, there's a whole industry out there that wants to help you. You're not asking for a favor. Use them. They want to work with you. I think no matter where you are, take a moment to give yourself some grace. Whether or not you feel like you're crushing it, enjoy that. Or you feel like you're way behind, you're probably doing a much better job, and maybe not quite a great job as you think you are, right? So the reality is give yourself some grace. Also, give yourself the gift of becoming aware. Because whatever it is that you're looking to achieve, from a financial perspective, it really does start with awareness. And then ask for help.
Heather Nelson: So good. So good. Thank you for inspiring me. I'm sure you inspired others. We'll put in the show notes how everyone can find and follow you, and all the things on how to work with you. I know I'm very interested in this, so I'm so glad that we were connected. And thank you for being here.
Lacy Garcia: Heather, thank you so much for having me on today. Thanks everyone for listening.
Heather Nelson: Awesome.