#90: Allegra’s Personal Wealth Story
Episode Summary
For the final Coffee & Coin podcast of the year, it’s only natural that we’d be feeling a bit retrospective - but instead of feeding you some annoying spiel about New Years resolutions, Allegra is offering up something much more valuable: her own finance story, from start to finish, for the first time. Little spoiler for you: it’ll leave you feeling pretty inspired about how much a persons life can change in a few short years, once they decide to change some habits.
Episode Notes
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Hey guys, it's Carol factors podcast editor. For the final coffee and coin podcast episode of the year, it's only natural that we'd be feeling a little bit retrospective, and a little bit excited about all the opportunity that a new year brings. But instead of feeding you some annoying spiel about New Year's resolutions, Allegra is offering up something much more valuable, her own finance story from start to finish for the very first time. Little spoiler for you, it might leave you feeling pretty inspired about how much a person's life can change in a few short years, once they decided to implement some new habits. So here's Serena in the new year, the only way we know how it seemed Ventura by highlighting the stories, lessons and money wins, big and small of wealthy women everywhere. I'll let Allegra take it away.
This is Allegra mo at Brandley. And you're listening to the coffee and coin podcast where women talk well, I'm the founder and CEO of Factoria. Have company on a mission to lead 1 million women to 1 million in net worth. Because when women have more money, we'll have more power to be the change we want to see in the world. If you're ready to hear real women share their real numbers and investment journeys and have a sneaky feeling you should be doing a little more with your money, you are in the right place. Just sit back, relax and turn me up.
All opinions expressed by Tim Ventura, and podcast guests are solely their own and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of factory Incorporated. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be used as the basis for investment decisions. Team Factoria and podcast guests may maintain positions in the securities or investments discussed in this podcast.
Welcome back to another episode of Coffee and coin. Today, I will be revealing my personal financial story from the beginning until now. I realize I've shared this in bits and pieces but never really given you the full shebang. So today's the day, folks, I'm going to lay it all bare. Because let's be honest, I love talking about numbers, being transparent, and breaking financial taboos by doing so. It's why I've dedicated my life to helping women become their most financially abundant selves in our mission to lead 1 million women to 1 million in net worth. So here I am. I'm going to share it all. Let's get started. I really think the first thing you should know about me and this story is that I am not unique. My story is not unique. It is like many of yours, I went to college, I got a job, I worked my ass off without stopping to look up to even determine what I really wanted out of life for about 12 years straight. I was underpaid for most of that time, I was confused about my money, and where it was all going for all of that time. And whenever I made money, I surely didn't seem to have more of it around me. I was decent at saving only when I had to, but terrified of investing. So I just kept putting that off for ages. And I definitely didn't talk about money openly. Nor did I have any financial mentors in my life to guide me. Before I get into the nitty gritty, I do just want to encapsulate the moral of the story, which is that with a lot of hard work, and zero formal financial education, as in NO, I did not go get a master's in finance or become a certified financial planner. I am a wealthy woman today. And I'm damn proud of it. And because of my journey, I know that it is absolutely possible for you to I mean, hello. This is why I started fact Torah, so that you dear listener could skip all the headache, confusion and lonely bad parts of my journey and get right to the sweet spot of understanding the financial principles and implementing the financial changes you need to change your financial life and trajectory for good. And moreover, have a supportive community of women to do it with so that you actually get out of the analysis paralysis and start taking massive action that feels so good and empowering. That is my wish for all of you. All right, let me take you back to the very beginning. I was raised by a single and very hard working mother as an only child. My mother grew up very well off but unfortunately her family lost much of their fortune before my grandparents died when my mom was in her early 20s. I was born in LA in 1980s Next to a mom and a dad that were in a very unhealthy and unstable relationship that did not last long. They were divorced by the time I was 18 months old. And they weren't even married until they were pregnant with me. So it was it was a short, it was a short marriage. After that my mom moved us across country from California to North Carolina and restarted her life with me in tow. As the story goes, she was actually driving around a neighborhood and saw a Fizbo, otherwise known as for sale by owner home, contacted that owner and managed to get them to agree to a rent to own situation. And that negotiation led her to a 30 year and counting real estate career. Financially for us, there were good times and bad times. But my first money memory is actually my mom, sitting at the table, balancing her checkbook, drinking a bottle of wine and crying. I knew our money situation wasn't good. But I also never knew how dreary it was. I remember getting used to her being upset and burdened by our money problems. And as a kid, I just wanted to cheer her up, I would slide little notes under her door with pictures and just wanted to make her stop crying. You know, I do want to be clear, I did not want for anything as a child, my mother, or big rat, as we like to call her. And I think she's finally taken a liking to that nickname, worked her ass off as many single mothers do to give me so many opportunities. I was obsessed with dancing, and she made damn sure I got to take all the dance classes. And I mean all of them ballet tap, jazz clogging, lyrical, you name it, I danced it, thanks to Big Red.
She was also fortunate enough to have gone to an all girls boarding school in Virginia shout out to Fox raft.
But I was able to attend that same school, partially on an academic scholarship of my own reward and partially on a scholarship for Daughters of women who attended but could no longer afford tuition. So after I went to that all girls boarding school that taught me so many of the leadership strengths that I have today, I really do look back and think that school for for so much. I attended a public college, the College of Charleston and South Carolina, also known as the College of knowledge, jokingly and then I graduated during the Great Recession of 2008. So finding a job was nearly impossible. But after a year of no luck and a move to Miami, my first corporate job out of college was with a $25,000 starting salary. And I was doing that job with other people who didn't just have college degrees, like I did, but also had master's degrees, and they were also only earning that meager 25,000. So through that job, I was actually able to get a job in New York for the Estee Lauder companies earning a $40,000 salary, which this job included a few really big moments, I like to reflect on one being that I was so financially illiterate at the time that I assumed going from a $25,000 salary to a $40,000 salary simply meant 15,000 extra dollars in my pocket. And that sounded pretty dang good to me because it was not easy living in Miami on 25k. But I did not take into account that I was living in Florida with no income taxes. And I was moving to New York City with some of the highest income taxes. So suffice it to say I was definitely living paycheck to paycheck in my early New York days too. But the other thing that really stood out from taking that job at the Estee Lauder companies is that when I went in for what I thought would be my third and final interview, it was actually their HR office to be offered the job directly. And I had dreamed of living in New York and really wanted to make more money. So I thought my dreams had just come true and my career was taking off. And when this HR woman asked me to sign in her presence. I didn't even hesitate. As in I didn't consider asking for more time running the numbers, figuring out that I was going to be paying income taxes or even remotely think through negotiating a higher salary. That moment was pivotal because eventually I became a salary negotiation coach down the line and realize through this experience, how many women that I worked with had also not even a tempted to negotiate their first second third, oftentimes any first salary offer they got. Okay, back to the story. So, I'm a broke New Yorker in 2012, completely immersed, but unable to afford all the fashionable things around me. So I did what any other fashion want to be does. And I just started and I decided to start my own fashion line, a luxury robe company called amo a only thing is, I didn't have any money for startup capital. But I did have a 401k with $6,000 sitting in it. And that was so much money to me back then. So I cashed it out, took a massive tax penalty hit something like 40%. And I got started with the remaining money. I did freelance and side hustle work on the side to make ends meet while I worked on the designs and manage to keep that company barely afloat for a few years, while going into credit card debt. Turns out, it is really hard to follow through on your dreams, when your financial health is very bad. I am such an avid believer that your financial health is integral to your overall wellness, just like your mental and physical health are. And when I started that company, not only did I not have any money, but that initial small amount of capital, which barely got me my fabric made, but I didn't have any backup money, I didn't have a plan. And so I ended up taking out credit cards going into debt. And it really caused me so much stress, I couldn't focus on the business. So after that, I went back to the corporate world for the air quotes safety net, of having a consistent paycheck. So I could try and get financially sound again. But here's the thing, if you don't have good financial habits, I mean actual habits that you are doing weekly or monthly and annually. If you aren't auto saving, auto investing, understanding your numbers, you aren't just going to start once you make more money. So you have to learn how to keep and grow your money. Otherwise, you'll get trapped in this. earn, spend, Earn Spend earns a never ending cycle that just requires you to keep at you're likely stressful, don't love it so much corporate job, as was my case, because remember, I started my career earning $25,000 salary. And after learning how to advocate for myself and getting back into the corporate world, I had hit and surpassed the 100k salary figure by my late 20s. But you would not have known it looking at my bank accounts. Everything that came in slipped right back out on all the things I wanted the new apartment, the vacations, the designer bags, I was really trying to keep up with the New York Joneses. And it was hurting me financially. So even though I was finally earning those six figures that I had so hoped for when I moved to New York, I was still pretty much living paycheck to paycheck. And suddenly I realized how much money I had blindly wasted while working my ass off to make more money. So this was when I knew it was time for a financial revolution. Something wasn't working. I couldn't break this cycle myself. And so I began to consume everything I could get my hands on when it came to personal finance and investing. Which led me to changing pretty much nothing won't want. The truth is I felt totally overwhelmed with all the information totally isolated, because I didn't have anyone to communicate the ideas with and share my learnings and volley the things that I wanted to do. Should I open this account? Should I invest in that ETF I just I wanted to do it all but I didn't know what order to do it in so I just got trapped in this analysis paralysis that I really don't want for you. But change was in there. Because I still knew deep down there had to be something more to the American dream then climbing a corporate ladder to further someone else's dream. Having visceral Sunday scaries and killing myself for six figures. I can't even tell you how stressed out I was when I left New York. It took me months to unwind physically, that stress in my body So, yes, we should all earn money. But what if it wasn't the only way to have more money? What if we could learn how to make our money work hard for us as we worked to get it in the first place? That's investing folks. Once I realized how life changing prioritizing buying assets over liabilities was, I finally got really motivated to not just learn this stuff, but to implement it. So first, I got clear on my financial goals, so I could get out of the $18,000 of debt I was in
move from New York City to Austin, because living in a lower cost of living area was going to help me build wealth faster. And that was my main priority. I saved $40,000. In my first ever emergency fund, I opened my first brokerage account, and started investing in the stock market. I open and fully funded my first IRA, that's an individual retirement account. In the past, I didn't even know that that was a viable option. For me, it's a viable option for all of us folks. I started building a real estate portfolio in Texas. And then I started Factoria. To help more women accomplish very similar goals. I did all of those items I just listed in two years, from 2017. When I set the goals and made the big move to Texas, to making Factorio, my full time job by 2019. It is now the end of 2021. And I have a net worth as of today's recording on December 28. I have $809,122. And that is not including Factoria. That is just the rest of my portfolio, my paper, my real estate, my crypto, my cash, etc. but not including my business asset. So there it is, folks, my financial journey in a podcast episode. I hope it was the reminder you needed that you can and deserve to have full autonomy over your financial life and future. And when you prioritize your money, and you learn the fundamentals of investing and wealth building, you get to be in the driver's seat of your life. No more riding shotgun, not calling the shots. I know I spent a number of years thinking that terrible thought of, if I could just make more money at my job, things would be easier. But I promise you that is a dangerous thought. Because to make more money at your job. There's a ceiling. And in order to break through that ceiling, you have to be investing and buying assets that is going to make you money passively. Otherwise, you're always going to be stuck working and frustrated by the feeling of not having enough. But a deep dive into personal finance, like we teach in the wall circle. And a supportive community can change all of that. So if you want to be a wealthy woman too. What are you waiting for? If you enjoyed this episode, come join us in a wealth circle. It's our live online 12 week course and community where we teach you how to create a personalized financial plan alongside hundreds of other women building wealth. It will change your life and your money for good. You can apply at factorial wealth.com forward slash wealth circle. That's factorial wealth.com forward slash wealth circle. See you in the next episode.