Podcasting Surprises & Financial Wins for 2024!
Have you ever wished for guidance and effectively growing your business and managing your finances? Or wonder what it takes to succeed as a female entrepreneur in finance? Then this is the podcast for you. Welcome to Women of Law, where generational wisdom meets ambition. I'm Ali Romo, your millennial host.
Intro:And I'm Hollywood's Greg, your gen x host. Using our combined backgrounds in insurance and financial services, we will share what we've learned to give you the tools you need to grow your business. Join us, and together, we will help you discover practical strategies for financial leverage, business growth, and securing your future.
Hawley:Hey, wealth warriors. Are you ready to redefine wealth and master your money mindset? Welcome to episode number 18 of Women of Wealth. I'm your gen x host, Hawley Woodsgrey. And I'm your millennial host, Ali Romo.
Hawley:Today, we will be talking with each other.
Ali:Yay. So to start us off, what we learned in season 1. So, Holly, why don't you start us off? What what's something that you learned in season 1?
Hawley:So I thought podcasting would be a lot less work. Honestly, I thought that I would just come on, and I kinda did because Ally took care of a lot of the administrative stuff in season 1. And we've made some changes so she can be, more we're gonna have my assistant work on doing our marketing and whatnot. So I learned that, it's a little bit more work than I thought it was gonna be. So just coming out and interviewing people, I'm down with that.
Hawley:However, everything that goes on behind the scenes, thanks to Ally, she made it look easy and flawless. However, there are a lot of steps. So that's one thing I learned. How about you? Yeah.
Ali:There were definitely more steps than I thought about working, or doing a podcast, creating the outlines. And, you know, I always I I realized that you need a lot more structure than just jumping on with your pal and talking to the world about all of the information that, you you both learned over the years. So excited to go on to season 2 and, give you guys some more information on how to grow your business and support your business financially. Yeah. Another thing that I learned is, sometimes your guests need to, rearrange, and you have to have a plan b for that.
Hawley:So if your guests aren't actually available or if there's, like, a hurricane coming through or I mean, some of the things that happened, we had one of our guests lost their electricity during the during the podcast. So, you know, being flexible, being able to adjust and go on fly. And if something happens, you know, just gonna laugh about it instead of being, like, oh, dang. That didn't work out the way we thought it was going to. Right?
Ali:Right. That's I mean, that's in business. That's in life. Things are just not always gonna work out how you plan to, and it definitely is true for podcasting. Right on.
Hawley:Well, some of the people that I'm very excited that we're gonna be working with I mean, we have, Jill Luman coming in. She's gonna be sometime in November. She is a world renowned author, and she just has a lot of great money mindset and other, strategies to help you be more successful in your business. We have a a millionaire maker, Michelle Jacoby, that's coming on, and she is also going to give you guys some great information. And I'm really excited about the partnership that we have with Exact Medicare and, and how they're gonna come on and talk to you during this open enrollment season.
Hawley:I realize there's a lot of women business owners that are gonna be that are gonna be turning, you know, 65 in the next, you know, 3 to 5 years and how they can plan for that now. And then also, I wanna bring in our, you know, Hispanic. We have a person who's an expert in the Hispanic market for, for Social Security. I mean, not Social Security, Medicare. And, she's going to be able to give you all tips.
Hawley:I mean, we are how far from the border, Ali? 30 minutes. 30 minutes max, maybe 10 miles. You know, with traffic, it takes about 30 minutes to get down there. However, I mean, when I come to San Diego now like I am today, it's the one thing that's on my list.
Hawley:I have to have Mexican food while I'm here. So, of course, I'll get my carnees out of burrito. And I'm excited that she's gonna be able to give that information, and we're gonna have one of our, Spanish speaking agents come on and help us out with the interview. So it should be fun and entertaining as always. Fun fact.
Ali:I get my dental work done in TJ. Yeah. So, yeah, it's it It's this beautiful smile, people. Oh, you can't even see it. We're in a podcast.
Hawley:Well, you might see it in our in one of our clips, so check our Instagram. Let's see. I gotta put my glasses back on so I know what's next. Yeah. And we're also gonna be covering this through 2.0.
Ali:So what is that? Because some people may not even know what the heck that is. Yeah. So, in 2019, Secure Act came out, and then it was redesigned in 2021. In 2022, it finally was released.
Hawley:And what it does is it helps Americans save more money. There's a very fun acronym for that that we'll share more about at a different time. And it helps business owners and employers have some ways to get their employees involved in saving for their retirement, but it also helps the employees and those business owners like ourselves take advantage of some of the tax cuts that are available as well. So we're we're gonna share 8 tips on that and how you can get more for your more bang for your buck, either if it's your employees or your personal retirement accounts, how you can make sure that you're set up to win there. And then also there's the sunset clause that's happening for our inheritance, and that's gonna be changing January 1, 2026.
Hawley:So we wanna make sure we continue to give you this information so that you're able to meet with your professionals that are on your team, your attorneys, your estate planning people, your financial advisors, your insurance agents, and anybody else who might be part of that conversation to make sure that you and your family are set up to win. Because it's a pretty if you're in that category where you have real estate or you have a business and you're going to, leave a significant amount to your heirs, you wanna make sure you really understand this because it's getting cut in half. So individual right now can give away 13,600,000. You might not be there yet, but if it changes or when it changes, it's gonna be half of that. So you wanna make sure that you really understand it so that you are set up to win.
Hawley:And it might not apply to everyone, but there are definitely things to do to make sure you're set up and ready to go. Yeah. And you made a a a point there of talking about the different types of people you have on your team, you know, attorneys, CPAs, insurance agents. And we just wanna remind you that, you know, we are licensed insurance agents, and we have other knowledge in other fields. However, how many people do you have on your team as a business owner who help you out?
Hawley:I mean, I have I have, like, 3 different attorneys I work with because one person cannot do it all. Like, my trademark attorney knows enough about, like, how to set up a business and a partnership to help me out. However, if there's a disagreement in a partnership, I have to go find a full different attorney to help me with that. And that's different than somebody who's gonna do my estate planning and my trust planning and, you know, if I have additional pieces of real estate. And, you know, my husband and I, just like Ali and her husband, have been working together, and we have a lot of different businesses outside of our primary business.
Hawley:We just wanna make sure that all those are protected not just for us moving forward, but also for our families as well as we continue to move on our journey, closer to retirement. I'm not going anywhere for a while, but, you know, wanna make sure that my decks are in a row when I get there. So you've got 3 attorneys, a CPA, a bookkeeper that I just fired, and I'm hiring someone new. I have a new assistant, a brand new assistant. Her name is Lee.
Hawley:You guys might get to meet her. She is fresh out of high school, so it's definitely been an enjoyable and fun opportunity for me to be patient, to practice all kinds of things. My patience, my training skills like communication, reach out and, you know, texting. Young people love to text more than they like to talk to you, it seems like, but that's okay. She's doing a great job, and and we just had a check-in meeting.
Hawley:So, you know, it's very easy to get overwhelmed in this business, so having the right people on your team are definitely gonna help you understand a lot more. I wish more of my clients had more people that they called on to check to check. I mean, some people just say, oh, I have a financial adviser. That's awesome. However, does he do insurance or does she do insurance?
Hawley:Are they able to help you with the business? Have they instructed you that you need to trust? I mean, all these different areas that we really hope to focus on and and start bringing together in women of wealth is is really it's really important that you have a team. I mean, I have all I have 21 leaders on my team. I had a meeting this morning.
Hawley:8 of them showed up, which I'm stoked about that. However, to disseminate information out even just to my team to get it to the agent level, I need to make sure that, you know, people are showing up and more people are available to be on these calls and and hear the information that we have because things just change so fast in this industry. And, you know, we have election coming up, so get out and vote. No matter what happens, there's gonna be changes to your finances one way or another. Taxes may go up.
Hawley:Taxes may go down. You know, middle class might not really be what you think middle class is. You know, upper class might be different than what you thought too. So really just getting educated on what the topics are that are important to you and making sure that you, get to vote on who that is that you want no matter where you are in the country, I think it's really important too. Yeah.
Ali:And then just to wrap up your your team, you I like that you made a good point about your financial adviser. I when I when I created my, s corp, I asked my CPA about the rules about retirement in California, and it was kind of a weird answer. So, you know, not one person can know everything, and they're not gonna be an expert on everything. So it really is a good idea to reach out because, you know, people can meet with me and that maybe I am not a good fit for them, but at least they got some piece of knowledge that's helpful for them to move forward, and that's okay. I mean, they come to us all the time just for Advice.
Ali:Advice or an ounce of knowledge, whatever. And so just reach out to someone who is an expert in that field. And so and we look forward to providing more tools to get you thinking about what you may need to look out for, what's to come, how to plan, and all that. Alright. So we're gonna give you some fun tips about holiday shopping and having holiday meals or maybe hosting your family and how you can be set up to win, in those instances because for me, I just had 3 sets of grandparents at my house in 1 week.
Hawley:It was pretty awesome. None of them really overlaps. However, it was an interesting experience for each one. So the first ones came in. They came in on a Friday night.
Hawley:They were there until Sunday night. You know, we cooked at home and did all this kind of stuff. But, like, when they were getting ready to leave, they gave me, like, $160 for the food, and I'm like, thanks. I don't really need that. They're like, no.
Hawley:No. We were gonna go out to dinner, and we did never make it. You know, like, they kinda changed plans a little bit less sooner than they were going to. And then the next group came in, and then we did go out to dinner. And then, you know, here I come back in the next morning that they're getting ready to leave, and they left us money too.
Hawley:I'm like, do our do our parents think we can't buy them food, Bobby? Like, you know? But it's good to think ahead, and it's really kind that they were thinking about us and really wanted to contribute to what we were doing. You know? Because sometimes when you have family over for for holidays, they don't think about that.
Hawley:They show up at free whenever dinner is gonna happen or whenever your late lunch is gonna happen. And then, you know, sometimes they ask what they can bring and sometimes they don't. How do you guys do it in your family? We usually have a sign up list. And so, you know, I mean, financially, Thanksgiving is quite expensive.
Ali:Yeah. It can be. And so depending on what your budget is, I like the sign up list because we have people in all different well, this Thanksgiving, we're not actually doing Thanksgiving with my family. I'm doing it with my in laws. That'll be a whole new world.
Ali:We'll talk about that too. But normally back. But normally, we have, like, a sign up list, and so our family has people on all spectrums of how they can contribute bringing food financially because food costs money. And so be honest with yourself. And so I love those sign up sheets because, you know, the people who can carry more of the weight, they can do that, and be the person that you know, right up front, don't wait till the last minute and be like, oh my gosh.
Ali:What am I doing? And that's when things are out of stock, and maybe the the lower priced items are out of stock or something, and now you're forced to get the more expensive one. So however however you need to budget, plan for that. And, and then I like the sign up list. So Sign up list is great.
Hawley:Maybe create that for you. Yeah. I mean, for us, usually, like, if if we go if we go to San Diego, then, like, I don't necessarily bring a lot. Like, sometimes Bobby will bake a pie or something like that, and we'll get all that one for shopping. But what I what I really do for my family is I make sure that I'm in the kitchen and I'm available and help out with whatever we need helping out with.
Hawley:And then, like, you know, Bobby and the boys might come in and do the dishes afterwards just so, you know, everybody can sit down and enjoy and and be a part of it. So sometimes it's not even financial. Sometimes it's just being able to enjoy the company that's in your home. I I mean, everybody in our house always gathers in the kitchen, so we have to, like, shoo them out because they just wanna be where all the action is. So yeah.
Hawley:And then for holiday shopping, you know, the best thing to do is make a list, and you don't have to put everybody on your list. If you have a big family, then you know there's a lot of options. We have a big family, and, you know, in one in one group of our family, which is probably not even the group that needs the financial help the most, we draw names, and we have like, we do Elster. And so they can put gifts on there. And we have a limit and stuff like that.
Hawley:And sometimes people go with limit and whatnot, and then we give them grief. But it's something fun for Christmas morning. And if we do have people that don't make as much money or whatever, then they don't feel bad because they could only spend $25, whatever the the cap might be. So that's a fun way of doing it. We've also done, like, white elephant gifts are good with a with an amount.
Hawley:But we always do, like, don't bring crappy white elephant gifts because nobody wants to go home with a box of ramen anymore. You know, we're we've outgrown that in our family. But, hey, teach their own. Yeah. We we do white elephants this year.
Ali:We're actually doing no presents, and we're going on a trip. So we're gonna go to Big Bear, I think. Hopefully. Let us know, Hopefully. Let us know, Hopefully.
Ali:White Christmas. I it's nice that we used to do those as kids because my dad was a ski patroller, and so sometimes he would work on Christmas, and so we would go up there. So this year, no gifts. However, in the past, I'm a big experienced person. So for my nieces and nephews, we bought them Sky Zone Jump Park, and we took them to Sky Zone.
Ali:There's enough material things out there, but the kids have enough stuff. I I love spending time with people because time is valuable. And so and then we do the white elephant. We used to pick names, but I don't think that was the best math. Like, sometimes you just were matched with a good personality.
Ali:So the white elephant. But, yeah, like like you said, no ramen. No ramen. Like, good quality gifts. There's enough animals that are, like, 3 generations old.
Ali:Seriously. Yeah. So, yeah, to keep I like your your tip of just creating a list of who you actually wanna buy a gift for and then create a budget around that. How much do you want to spend for that? And look right now.
Ali:It's it's we're gonna launch this in November, the beginning of November, so you've got 2 months to to plan for that. And maybe, like, you start doing your shopping now, so that you're not using one paycheck or something like that for for Christmas. And don't go in debt for Christmas gifts. People love you more than the gift that you're going to give them. So Absolutely.
Ali:I like, for people in my life, please don't put something on it in the credit cards that you cannot pay for. Exactly. The other thing too is if you're not sure like, I have a friend. We've been friends for a really long time. We've been friends since high school.
Hawley:And a lot of times, we we will see each other over the holidays, and we don't exchange gifts with each other. And now we only have our youngest kids exchange gifts. It used to be because she has 2 older boys, and she has a a daughter that's about the same age as Jackson. So sometimes if we're getting together around Christmas, then we'll get those 2. But we've talked about it.
Hawley:Like, we're like, I'm not getting anything. Don't give me anything. Let's get something for the kids that they'll enjoy and, you know, it's not like they need another thing like Allie was saying, but, you know, 11, 10 year olds expect a little something to open. You know? So, and we usually go out to dinner or something like that just to celebrate seeing each other.
Hawley:You know, we don't see each other as much as we used to. So, so communicate. I think communication is the key in almost every financial situation, especially if, you know, you are strapped. I know people inflate with inflation, and, you know, a lot of people, a lot of jobs have been cut recently and a lot of people have changed what they do or whatever. It is okay to do something outside the box for Christmas.
Hawley:Like, hey, this year, we're gonna build a puzzle puzzle together. We're all gonna sit around and do this puzzle for 3 hours, and that'll be a lot of fun, especially if there's alcohol involved. Yeah. I was actually just talking to someone the other day. Like, our our attention and, like, our our time, and it is most valuable.
Ali:I mean, you see it on social media. Everyone's fighting for your attention. You see it, in in workplaces. Hey. You need to be here at this time.
Hawley:You know? Yeah. Holly and her team. Yeah. My team.
Ali:Yeah. So your your time is valuable, so why don't you spend the holidays actually being together? Maybe you make a no phone zone. I love that. No phone zone.
Hawley:No phone zone. No electronics. 1 hour of electronics a day. That's it. You walk You walk through our house on Christmas and everyone's phone's off.
Hawley:I love that. Oh, that'd be incredible. That'd be, like, the best gift ever. And then you have, like, the do not disturb so people actually know, like, you're not looking at your phone. You've ever had somebody that text you and you didn't respond fast enough so they might called you or something?
Hawley:I mean, I've only done that to my husband. I don't do that to other people. And, usually, it's gotta be like an emergency situation. You know? Like, I got in a car accident.
Hawley:I need you to actually call me. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah.
Hawley:Alright. Anyway, we're getting off topic here. So, you know, when you're looking at the holidays, just, you know, be responsible about it. Like, it's it's okay if you are, in a position where you're on a budget and you write out how much you're gonna spend on each person or this is the thing that they would like. I mean and I like thoughtfulness too, but I also like to make sure people know what I want.
Hawley:So I love this Elster thing because you can just put, like, a few things on there. I mean, I've got some of the best things from that. I got, like, this little travel mask that has Bluetooth in it. And so, like, if I'm traveling with people and I don't really you know, like, I'm a light sleeper, so I can put my my music on while I'm going to sleep or my meditation or whatever. That was a great gift.
Hawley:It's, like, 15 months. You know? So it's like you can find really cool things, especially now, that people really can enjoy based on their lifestyle. That's that's really, really something that they could use in a lot. So a lot of great tips.
Hawley:But, yeah, just make a list. Stick to your list. Check it twice. No. I'm sorry.
Hawley:And communicate with your loved ones. Communicate with your loved ones because they probably rather spend the day with you than you spending $15 on it or something. So yeah. Alright, everyone. Thank you for tuning in.
Hawley:We look forward to a great season 2. Ally, why don't you tell them how they can connect with us?
Ali:Yeah. We're on Instagram at wow women of wealth, and we'll be sharing all of our speakers on there and clips from previous episodes. So go follow us and share our content there.
Ali:I believe we also have a Facebook page, Wow Women of Wealth as well. So if that's where you hang out, go follow us and share any content that you find valuable on there. Yes. And very soon, you'll be able to connect with us on our YouTube channel, which will be women of wealth dot VIP. You'll be able to see all of our, well, you'll see most of our podcast as videos, and you'll be able to connect with us there as well.
Hawley:So take care, everyone. Have a great day, and we'll talk to you soon.
Intro:Thank you for joining us on this week's episode. We'd love to hear from you, so make sure to follow and tag us on Facebook and Instagram at Women of Wealth podcast. Your support means the world to us. Until next time. Remember, your financial future is in your hands.
Intro:Stay informed, stay inspired, and embrace your will. See you on the next episode.
