#68: Wealth Circle Transformation Series: Renee G. Is Back!
Episode Summary
Renee G. is an OG alum of the Wealth Circle who has previously joined Allegra on the podcast to talk about how she used the tools she learned from Factora to exponentially grow her net worth. Now, she's back on the pod to talk about how she DOUBLED her net worth in just two short years. She also talks about her new side hustle, why she decided to take a job with a lower salary, and how she and her husband are using their financial strategy to plan for a family.
Episode Notes
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Transcript
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This is Allegra Moet Brantly. And you're listening to the coffee and coin podcast where women talk wealth. I'm the founder and CEO of factoria. of 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 at the turn knee.
All opinions expressed by Team factoria and podcast guests are solely their own and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of factoria 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 a very special well circle transformation episode with my dear friend Renee. She joined a well circle in 2019, which isn't that long ago. But you will hear today how much progress she has made and never looked back. She is also a factoria facilitator, advocate, real life millionaire and has come on to help get our corporate workshop series out to the working women of the world. So welcome to the show, Renee. Hi, I'm so happy to be here again.
And she says again, because actually, we did the last in person live coffee and coin event in February 2020. Before the world went dark Three weeks later. And it's just crazy to think back that we were in a Capital One cafe with 150 women in the room, you are sharing your financial life story, from your personal struggles to your professional successes and everything in between. And I know you've made a ton of progress since then. So now we're having you back on the pod so 1000s of women can listen in. Are you ready? I'm ready. Yeah, that was such a wild and fun day. And it's just crazy to think how far we've come. Since that day, it truly, truly is just to think that the world kind of stops spinning on all cylinders. And yet, there has still been a lot of progress in both of our lives personally and factoria. And your business, which we'll get into. But one thing I don't want to forget, before we get into the episode, we have our very last investing 101 webinar coming right up on August 5. So there's a link to join in the show notes if you want to learn how to get into the stock market. And really just demystify this awesome asset class that can be overwhelming and intimidating until you start to understand its mechanics. Okay, so first, could you go ahead and give us a short bio on kind of what you do to earn income? And then we'll get into your story? Of course, yeah, so I've been I'm down. I'm here in Austin, Texas. I am in the software, SAS industry, and I've been in tech sales for 11 years here in Austin. I've had a great career so far in sales and sales management. And that's what I pretty much do for my day job. And as you'll hear, you know, I've added on to side hustle incomes both with my photography business Penske photo, but also with some contract work for factoria. And where are you from originally? Originally, I'm from Long Island, New York. So I made my way down to Texas. I wasn't born here. But I got here as fast as I could. I went to the University of Texas at Austin and have been here ever since planning my routes. I always think about the friends I have here in Austin that went to UT. Meanwhile, I didn't know UT existed, like was never on my radar ever. And I really have so many friends who came here for college and didn't leave, which I'm pretty sure I would have done the exact same thing if that had even been an option. But Texas was not on my roadmap for way longer than you unfortunately. But I too got here as fast as I could. Oh, and I'm so fortunate. You know, I met my husband at UT and all my group of friends than a lot of us are lucky in that we got jobs in Austin and stayed here or folks went to Houston, Dallas, other cities and then eventually migrated back. So I love being here. Yeah, you
You have a really big college crew and a college sweetheart that you married which is pretty freakin adorable.
I'm lucky. Yes. So take me back. What was your very first money memory, which I know you shared in your original episode, but for the newbies, tell me what your initial experience with with money was? Yeah, totally. And everyone go check out that original Episode Number eight, where I spilled my guts. And my whole story, but my first money memory was very negative. So I think I shared with you Allegra. Growing up, I was born to two Deaf parents. And so watching them navigate the world as a young child with that disability was really impactful. And I often saw them and learned from some of the the poor decisions that they made simply just because of you know, where they came from and what they had access to. And so we were we had just moved into our second mobile home in a trailer park. And they had looked to hire some contractors to build out a deck for them. And finally, you know, got the right person that they thought was going to help set them up. And they wrote him a check, contract or cashed it and was never to be found again. And so I watched him pretty much steal close to $30,000, I believe from my parents and just watched in complete disbelief at what had just happened to us. And so I think from that money memory, I took away that money is fleeting it comes and goes and you have to hold on to it, or else it could be gone the next day. So how did that impact you as you started to shape your financial life? What were your behaviors with money when you started to manage your own finances?
Yeah, definitely. And when when we talked last year, I was all about a scarcity mindset. I, again was so worried that I wouldn't have money that it kind of ping pong back and forth between piling it up, saving it away, and then spending it all as soon as I could. And I kind of went back and forth through that pattern for several years until I finally learned what it meant to save and hold on to your money. I think I got a big wake up call when I realized that aspirations of getting a home and a family, those things could never be real for me if I didn't get my shit together. So and then once I did start saving and watching that number grow, it almost became a game for me in my savings account, I wanted to see that number increased higher and higher every month. But then I think it became a little bit unhealthy because I I was just hanging on to that money for fear of it going away. And likewise, I wasn't really taking any risks when it came to career or jobs or anything like that, because I was so comforted by the the number that I would see come into my bank account and into my savings account every month. And so that that really, you know, money is fleeting, that was one of my mindsets that I wrote down in our wall circle two years ago. And now I can really see how that was manifesting in my life, then I can totally relate to your wake up call. I had a similar one, I was just rapidly approaching 30 and thinking, how is it that I'm supposed to start a family one day, have a company just have some bandwidth to do the things I want in life if I have no money to do that, that definitely got me into my financial revolution. But I do think it's interesting that you really went from fleeting to hyper saving. And then I think that's kind of where factoria came in. So tell me how you found factoria when you found factoria and I know that you took well circle number four, initially, we're about to launch full circle 26. So that's really cool, because you're a total Oji but yeah, what led you to Sakura? Well, it's so funny that you said you turn 30 and you're like what the hell am I doing? And that was the same. Same thing with me. I had turned 30 and the prospect of starting a family was on the roadmap for me. And I was kind of stuck in this job that paid really well but it wasn't fulfilling me and my boundaries were like totally out of whack. But I was so scared to make a move I was I was thinking I'll never get paid as much I you know, this will be a few steps back and I've just got to keep keeping out this because that's what you're supposed to do. And so I turned 30 and I hired a life coach and I was like I gotta get my finances under control because at least if I feel more comfortable
With where my money is going, I know nothing about investments. So I've got to figure that out. And if I can do that, then I can start to make some of these other moves like changing jobs and starting a family. And so that's what led me to factor I had just met you, Allegra, you did a salary negotiation workshop, downtown Austin. And it was like maybe 20 women, and you'd asked everyone how much money they made, and they had to say it out loud. And I remember like, my, I got sweaty, and I started like, heart started racing. And I was like, I can't possibly say that number out loud. Like, this is gonna be really embarrassing and scary. And then you said, you were starting up the wealth circles. And I just knew I had to be a part of it. I think it's so funny, because that's what he palms feeling. I mean, absolutely, everyone gets that when we kind of launch you into sharing your numbers. But sharing a salary is nothing compared to sharing a net worth. Because I think it's really easy to be like, this is my industry, and my industry only pays, you know, this range of money. But then you have to share your net worth and your net worth is going to reveal way more, right? Not just your annual income, but maybe you had to take on a bunch of loans to go to college. And so you're still in the negative. And that can feel so bad. Even if it shouldn't, it still does initially. And there's such a freedom and sharing it vulnerably because once you've said that number, it's like, oh, it's just a number. It's not a big deal. It's just a starting place. And we all want the same thing, which is to get that networth up into the right. So I'm sure that sharing your salary that day was hard. But I'm interested to know if sharing your net worth was even harder, which I've now made you do publicly a few times. Yeah, that was also terrifying. And I remember in our first wall circle, this is before the platform, you know, was virtual and national and actually global. You know, we have international women in our wall circles. But this was one it was six people sitting in the living room of your house. And I was I was like, No way I've not I can't say this number it's gonna be it's gonna be embarrassing. And I remember I actually had one of the higher networks and some of the women shared with me, they were like, it was actually good to see that you were a little uncomfortable and scared to share that number. Because then it made us feel more comfortable sharing. Because all that shows is that no matter where you are, or where you're starting from, it's still really scary to think about that number and say it out loud for the first time. So and that's what I learned from this experience, which I've now heard hundreds of women share their net worth. And it is scary for everyone. It doesn't matter if you are multimillionaire or negative hundreds of 1000s of dollars. It's just nerve racking, because it's something we haven't done. It's a muscle we haven't flexed. It's a conversation we haven't started. But it's so important because that helps us break taboo and start talking about money. So let's start talking about your money journey. What was your net worth coming into factoria? And then let's break down what that consisted of. Yeah, of course. And, you know, this when I was in my wall circle, and I put together my net worth, I'd never even done that before. So I was actually really impressed. You know, I did say I'm fortunate I did not have any student loan debt. And I think right away, that put me at a big advantage over a lot of my peers. And so I'm grateful for that. But my net worth was $506,000. It's a joint household net worth, I have a husband, I have a partner. And and so we had purchased our first home a couple of years before that. And then you know, I had paper assets, I had roughly $250,000 in investment accounts. However, most of that the majority was piled away in retirement accounts that you know, we can't touch for decades to come. Unless something you know, dire happens and you need to tap into that. So majority was was there. I think I had just opened up a wealthfront account from a recommendation of a friend of mine. But I was only putting 50 bucks a month into it because I was so scared. And the rest of that, you know, I had about 100 grand in cash, that I had just been kind of stockpiling into my savings. Okay, so I'm going to really break that down $506,000 net worth with 250,000 of that invested, but the majority of that was invested in retirement or tax advantaged accounts, which means there's a lockup period she really can't access them until she's 59 and a half without a penalty or a particular
Reason like education for children or first time home, etc. A tiny bit of that in taxable brokerage account, she had a wealthfront account, that means it's hers, she can put in as much as she want access it whenever she cares to. But of course it doesn't have the tax benefits that a retirement account has $100,000 in savings, and the remainder was equity in the home that you'd purchased. Did I get it? Right? Exactly. Yep. Fabulous. So let's go ahead and just fast forward everyone to right now, because that was in what? February 2019 2019. Yep. April, May 19.
April 2019. And now we are recording this in July 2021. So what is your net worth currently, and if you could break that down? Yeah. And I wish I could say I was like, just as shocked. But to put this number together. But I'll be honest, through my experience with factoria, I put I fill out this network spreadsheet every three months, because I love to see the progress. And I love to watch it go up into the right. But I was shocked when I looked back at that initial number because I hadn't seen it in some time. But I have since doubled our household net worth to $1.1 million, which is so exciting. It's crazy to say, I mean, I'd never ever thought in my wildest dreams, I would hit that number. I had written it on a post it note in my bathroom to hit by age 35. And we're here we are three years ahead of that. And so I'm just so excited. Love it. Okay, break down that 1.1 for us, where is it all at? Okay, so I would say, you know, here in Austin, our housing market is through the roof, so to speak. And
so my equity in my house has grown, we did refinance a little bit, we didn't pull out any equity, however, but the house value has increased almost $200,000. So that was a good amount of it. That's nearly half of our net worth, I've increased our investments to roughly 700,000, which is really exciting. And the majority of that is in brokerage accounts that we've opened up since the wall circle. But we also put away roughly 15% into our retirement accounts through our employers every month. So and I don't even see that money, it goes straight there. And so that has really ratcheted up over the last two years. And then we have a small amount in cash less than I did two years ago, which is by design, I was holding way too much in cash. And I learned that when we were going through the wall circle, so I have roughly about 73,000 in my cash accounts. Can you talk to me a little bit about how your cash accounts are divvied up? Do you have that all in one place? Or do you have like a few different goals behind behind your cash? Yeah, so I, we I love this conversation. Because we factor we always talk about, you know, every dollar and every account has a purpose. And I didn't have that strategy before. So I use a very popular high yield savings account, I have it broken out into three or four buckets. And so there's a emergency fund that's fully populated, then I have a downpayment fund for an investment property that we eventually want to hone in on. And then I've got a vacation fund. And now I have a tax fund as well.
Because 2021 was a rough year for us for taxes. Okay, I love it. Now I'm going to really break down your current net worth, let me know if I get it right. So 1.1 million net worth. So it's more than doubled since 2019. That's two years ago, listeners, your cash went from 100,000 down to 73,000. By Design, and it has buckets for the goals. Your house went up in equity. So that's more like 600,000 now, and you're invested paper assets you took from 250,000 before, up to 700,000 now and that's broken down between your tax advantaged retirement accounts. And all of what you guys have contributed to your taxable brokerage accounts that, as we mentioned before, are more easily accessible if you want to use that money before you're 60 years old. Did I get it? Yeah, you nailed it. And last year, I mean, so those that paper assets are obviously the investment accounts are obviously where we saw so much growth and I would really attribute that to just like keeping our heads
down and staying super disciplined. We have a high investing, right? You know, I think in in 2020, we invested 44% of our income. And this year so far we've invested 52%. And so that alongside the investing, or sorry, the compounding interest to watch that number go up. Obviously, we've had, you know, we haven't had any major events in the in the market since then. But it's been really powerful to watch what can happen in just two years. Yeah, it's huge. And I actually love what you just said about staying focused on your investment strategy and ignoring all of what's happening in news. That's something we really like to talk about in the wall circle, because it is so easy to get FOMO over something that's happening and want to get in. But that's a reactive investment approach, right? That's like, I can't stop hearing about GameStop. So let me invest in GameStop. Well, you bought in the high, and then it didn't turn out so well. Meanwhile, if you have said, these are the accounts I'm going to contribute to these are the funds or you know, the different selections of securities that I've decided are diversified for my portfolio, and I'm going to contribute to them on a monthly or, you know, I don't know, if you do week over week basis, whatever it is for you, you just keep to that, and you ignore all of the the news pundants. And the panic out there. Because the whole point of investing is it's a long term journey. And you can't have those compounding returns without waiting a significant amount of time. But look how much you've already experienced in just two years. But a huge part of that is your amount of contribution. So you heard her say that her investment rate went up from 44% in 2020. And just to clarify what an investment rate is, it is the amount of money you invest out of your total income. So she's taking her total household income from her and her partner, and dividing into that the amount of money that gets put into investment accounts. That was 44%. And then you raised it to 52%. This investment rate is one of your most important wealth factors. Because it's something we have total control over when our income comes in, we have a choice, we can spend that money on something that doesn't bring us a return. Or we can spend that money on assets that do have a return. And yeah, it's delayed gratification, but it is so worth it. I mean, look at how much you've seen in just two years. But I just want to be clear, it's not that the market is just returning her compounding returns, it is but at the same time she's upping how much she contributes to it, which is so huge, because that's the factor that we have, I can't control the companies that she invest in and whether they do well. But you can control how much you invest into them and how bullish you are on the likelihood of those companies sticking around and their officers doing their job, which is making them more profitable, so that you get those returns and higher valuation. The other thing I think is really important to your story is that I know, when you came to the wall circle, you had a very high paying job as a sales director, also a stressful job managing a lot of people. Can you talk me through how much money you are making then at your job verse, how much you're making now, because To my knowledge, you're making less than you once were, and yet your net worth is going up. And I think that's really important to share. Yes, absolutely. And, you know, I also want to reiterate how important it is to get started early. Because I mean, I got my first corporate job when I graduated college at 21. And so 11 years later, I'm really seeing the compound returns from putting in my money into a 401k that early. And I you know, I would watch some of my peers around me get a big bonus check from a sale, and then go buy a Lexus. And I thought that's great. And that's awesome for them. They value that I didn't necessarily value that at the time. And I kept my percentage that I was contributing automatically to my 401k pretty high and I slimmed down how much I was actually seeing in my bank account from a spending perspective. And so now I wake up 11 years later, and I'm so happy that I did that early on. Because now I'm I just can't even imagine where that's going to be 10 1520 years down the road from now. And it gets me really excited to think about like the kind of life that I can live with my family. And so I forgot what the question was.
Well,
hold on, right there because I think it's a really good point that when you said you can imagine where that money is going to be you kind of can because there's something called doubling periods and the rule of 72. So the rule
72 states that if you divide the average annual return of an expected investment into 72, you will get the number of years, it will take that amount to double without contributing anything else. So if you have $700,000 in paper assets right now, and you plan to keep it there for a lot for the long term, and hopefully see 8% average annual rate of return, which is a typical number use for the stock market net of inflation, again, over the long term, then you can recognize that 72 divided by eight is nine years. So it'll only take nine years for those investments to double without contributing another dollar. So that's 700,000 could be worth 1.4 million when you're what 42. And then it could be worth 2.8 million when you're 52. And then you just you keep going from there. So like that's the really fun stuff to think about and be like, Oh, totally not worth getting the Lexus for the immediate gratification, because I could add $50,000 to my paper assets. And it could be even more than those quick rule of 72 doubling period numbers I just did. And that is what makes investing so fucking cool. And powerful as a woman who understands it and leverages it for our future. The question was, how much money were you making? You came to factor? And kind of what happened from there? Because I think you you purposely took a pay cut. And I'd love for people to hear that your investments went up even as your income went down? Yeah, so I was making 240,000 when I quit my previous job, hence why she was scared of leaving, because who makes a quarter million dollars when they're under 30? I would also be terrified to leave that job. But but continue. Yeah, exactly. And I had to like pinch myself every day, if you hear my story from, you know, back our last podcast, I never once in my life thought I would make that kind of money. And then it kind of, you know, keeps you a little bit in handcuffs. But I so I in when we were in our wealth circle, I wrote down I want to maintain 75%. And what's funny now is I watched some of the money winds come through on slack. And there are some women that say, you know, I took a new job I got, I have way more time back in my life, and it's much more aligned with my goals. And I got a 40% raise.
And I'm like, holy shit, like, that's awesome. I definitely was not asking for enough money. You know, but so that's been insightful to see that happen with a lot of women in our community. But I took a step back $270,000 and, and then within six to nine months, I was overperforming. And this year, I will overperform. And so it'll get me closer back to that 200k mark. And that has also allowed me to have more free time on my nights and weekends. Don't get me wrong, it's a very demanding job. I love it. I work really hard. But I do have more time, especially during the pandemic, when we weren't doing anything on nights and weekends, there was nowhere to travel to no friends to see, unfortunately. But I was able to put a lot of time and effort into my side hustle my photography business. And so I've actually made up the difference in that pay cut. But I've also gotten more time back, I'm doing something I'm really passionate about I have more flexibility, less people like relying on me as a sales director. Now I'm an individual contributor. And so I just feel all around like more fulfilled, despite initially thinking I was going to have to make less money. I remember in that wall circle, because you're managing so many people at a young age, obviously, there's a lot of responsibility and stress that comes with that. And I remember you saying like I'm willing to take a pay cut as long as it comes with the flip side of not having to manage people getting to have some of my personal time and space back and so that you could launch your side hustle. So then tell people what your side hustle is, and the really cool thing you did during the pandemic. Yeah, so I started. I remember in our wealth circle, you asked like, what would you do if you got fired tomorrow? And I was like, I guess I could take pictures of people. I like doing that. And in the middle of our wealth circle, one of my friends asked me to take some headshots for her so she was my very first paying customer. And so fast forward, you know, the end of the wall circle, we had to set our goals on what we wanted to accomplish and so by the end of the year,
I wanted to get to $150 a month in recurring, you know, revenue for Penske photo. And I remember thinking like how the hell am I going to get people to pay me $150 a month, like, that's a lot of money. And then fast forward now to July 2021, I'm making at least 1200 a month gross revenue. And
I am doing probably three or four shoots a week, I think overall, I've achieved roughly $40,000. But how that all started was really because in the beginning of the pandemic, you know, I was always a gogogo type of person, I was in the office all the time, we were traveling on the on the weekends, we were with our friends or family all the time. And so we got really lonely and you know, my husband's extremely extroverted. And so being in the house all the time, during that two week, lockdown was really tough for us, just not seeing people. And so I saw something on Good Morning America, where there was a photographer that had gone around to all the local neighbors and taking pictures of people, you know, more than six feet, probably 10 feet away from, from them to keep the social distancing aspect to it. And he was he was just going around and taking pictures. And so I thought, I would love to do that and also contribute to the community somehow. So in March 2020, I set up a front porch fundraiser, I called it fence key photo front portraits. And I basically just posted on Instagram, like who wants a cute picture in front of your house, and you can pay whatever you want, I'll donate it to the central Texas Food Bank here in Austin, I matched the first $1,000. And together, we raised over 70 $500, I drove to 75 houses, on my nights and weekends, I put over, you know, 1000 miles on my car. But it was so much fun, because people had a reason to get dressed up and do their hair and makeup and, and I got to see everyone, I'll be it from afar. And it really just gave me so much energy. And I was so happy to do it. But yeah, it was a blast. And I'm looking back now I didn't do it for money. You know, it wasn't something that I thought, Oh, this is going to be a great marketing strategy. And you know, like hindsight is 2020. But that was legitimately The best thing I could have ever done. Because I met so many future clients from it, that are still hiring me to take pictures of, you know, milestones for their family and whatnot. But I came to your house and took one of you and are in your cute path. And in your now husband. And that was so fun. Yes, we have our very own front portrait that I love with our new dog that we adopted during quarantine, who was barking at you and just being the ball of anxiety is, but I love that whole story. It honestly, like almost makes me cry. Because it was a way that you could truly do everything you care about like give back to your community, take pictures, see people have a creative outlet. And it was all your design. You know, you had you saw one thing on Good Morning America, and then you turned it into your version of how to do that. And that is I think the beauty of having a life by design. And I think that when you start to get control over and clarity with your finances, you can do more things like this. Instead of living in that kind of rat race of like, I go to work, I make income I want my boss to still like me, so they'll pay me income. And then because I don't have a strategic plan with my money, I still stress about money. And when I get it, I spend it and I don't have goals for it. And when you can get out of that and over here into this creative bandwidth. You can do things that are so inspiring. I think your friend portrait series was extremely inspirational. And I think you should do it again.
The annual thing.
Yeah, and that's so true. Like, because in my past job, like don't get me wrong, I loved my team. I loved them as humans, but my energy was being drained in that job. And I you know, come nights and weekends, I was looking for ways to just burn through the weekend. And once I transitioned to a job that actually gave me energy and like fulfilled a purpose, but not my whole purpose. It really freed up my time to be able to do other things that fulfilled me creatively. And so now I just feel you know, on the weekends, I'm I'm not just trying to survive the weekend and then get there have Sunday scaries
Get to another Monday morning. That's horrible. I'm really just energized throughout the weekend and finding creative ways to do what I love and make money at it. I love it. I'm also sitting here thinking, what was what was it called? When you were little? I can't even remember if I ever got got one of these, but I know that my friends had it. It's like they they do a silhouette of your face as a child. And they might do it annually. And then you know, your face changes your hair changes to remember what those are called, you know what I'm talking about right now? I don't, but I can, I can picture it exactly. Okay, well, I remember them being in some of my houses where it'd be one kid, you know, this year, and then the next year, and then the next year, and you could see kind of how their face changes from child into adolescent. Your friend portrait series is almost like that, especially the factorial women who are constantly buying and flipping houses, they can really get the journey of of your life, even if you're at the same house, like, do you have a baby? Is it bigger, etc. So
I'm really a fan. I'm really a fan of the front portrait series. And I think you need to bring it back. But okay, so back to you. And some of your changes. I would just love to know, going through the wall circle. What were some of your biggest aha moments? And what changes did those lead to? Yeah, I think well, first and foremost, it was we already talked a lot about it. But the idea of flipping the conventional savings and investing wisdom on on its head. I mean, I remember that session, and it was crystal clear to me. But you know, conventional wisdom says save 50% or sorry, live 50% of your income, spend 30, and then save 20. And that was always good enough. And not everyone is as fortunate to be able to do that. But if you can slim down and flip that and try to save 51st live 30 or, and then spend 20, how much faster you can get to financial freedom. And so ever since I learned that from you, and from the session that has won what has been the fuel, lighting my fire to just keep investing, and ratchet that up. That was the first thing. And the second thing is how important it is to be vulnerable and talk about this stuff with women like today, it's really easy for me to sit here and talk to you, and like spill my guts out. And even then I'm gonna send this to my friends and family. And then they're gonna know everything, that my whole financial story. And at one point in time, that would have really terrified me. But being vulnerable and opening up about it, all it does is foster such better conversations about like, really what you want your life to be and what you want it to look like and what you're working towards. And like with my friends and family, you know, it's opened up conversations around career and money and real estate and you know, what we want to do with our future families. But then with the factorial women that I meet with every month, you know, I've one accountability partner I meet with every single month. And we get really nitty gritty on what we're talking about. I mean, I will share my whole spreadsheet with her, she'll share with me her whole investment allocation spreadsheet. And like, that's not something we would have ever done before. But once you really dig in on the details, and you have that shared foundation of vulnerability and honesty, then you have someone cheering you on and holding you accountable. And like you can't let them down, you know. So that's been the biggest thing for me. And every time I talk to you, you always ask like, what's, what's next for me? And what do I want to work on? And what are my goals? And so it just all around makes life richer that way when when you are able to have those conversations, and I never would have done that before factoria. I love that so much that answer because it actually brings up a really good point that I never think to talk about on the podcast, I bring women on, and they share their financial stories with listeners, which is amazing, because even that in and of itself, like you said, is not something people were doing. But when you go through a wall circle and then you start meeting up with other wall circle women, you realize that what we're talking about on this podcast is really top line stuff like we're talking about your overall net worth, and I'm breaking it down in between your savings, your investments, your real estate, and maybe your business assets. There's so much within each of those asset classes, and we get real granular with that, like I to share my investment portfolio and exact selections with not just facts who are women, but the people I employ at factoria like Whitney and Julia know everything about
About my financial life that is very unusual for someone to know, their, like, quote unquote, co workers total financial like view, they can see everything, because we have taken something that was once so not okay to talk about and then like, not only is this okay, but the more we talk about it, the more we learn from each other strategies and we can implement. And this is why I'm always sitting here saying like, who do you go to in your life? That's a woman for financial advice, where's the female Warren Buffett's Where are the, like, awesome, women in finance, who are sharing their exact investment portfolios with the world, a lot of men are doing it like my husband follows on Twitter, all of these people in different sectors who are investing in different things who are sharing the exact makeup of their portfolio, but you don't see women doing it. And so the wealth circle, I think puts everyone on a level playing field so that they understand all the terminology, and the different options. But then they go off, and they share their exact strategies and numbers and goals and how they're tracking them. And that is like, that's the creme de la creme right? And we don't get into that on the episode, because I don't want to bore you guys with all of the names of the funds that are in Rene's brokerage account, you could be like, okay, cool, it would just be me listing, like whatever you've got in your wealthfront account, but, and it wouldn't be relative at that point, because you may not understand those selections. So this is just kind of the top line stuff and having an accountability partner, you can get so much deeper. So I love the brought that up, I think you bring up to really like interesting points, like, yeah, in the wall circle to like, every woman ends up doing something different, that makes sense for them. And historically, I was always scared that I wasn't doing the right thing. But then when you have these conversations, and it's it's all self directed, like I call up these women, and I'm like, tell me what is in your portfolio? And why are you doing it, and I want to know, because then it helps inform my decisions. And I think as women, we don't do that at all, in conversations previously, a lot of times it's male dominated, and there's so much confidence and bravado and kind of arrogance around it to be frank, that then you just feel even more silly kind of speaking up or asking questions. And so when it's a safe space with a bunch of women who are all aligned, it feels so much better. And women usually are not putting this first, they're usually putting other priorities first, whether it's family or home, or job, or spouse, or kids or whatever. And, like it's so important that we put put it first for ourselves. And when we don't defer those decisions to other people, because, you know, that's ultimately it is your life and you have to, you want to be in control of it, you bring up another great point when you say that, because one of the first things we say is like, Look, we want you to have full autonomy over your financial life. because believe it or not, you know it best, you know where you are currently, and where you want to go better than any financial professional you could ever hire. They don't have your same goals, they don't have your same background, they don't have your same money scripts in your head or fears. So you getting this knowledge and you taking massive action. And by the way, you're not going to get it right all the time. There are so many women I've watched open up one brokerage account and be like, Oh, I don't really like the returns, I'm getting over here, or I don't like the user experience. So I'm going to shut that one and go over here. Great. You just learned something, you took massive action, and then you relooked and you decided to pivot that strategy altogether. And if you aren't doing that you're in a worse place than if you are doing that and saying like, hey, that didn't work as well for me. And that's another good reason of why you have these women that you can talk to and say, Okay, why are you investing in that? Because so many people want a formula to follow. And it's just you can't there's no recipe because your life and your goals are different than my life and my goal. So we need to be invested in different things for different amounts of time based on those. And so it's really good to be able to ask women okay, but why are you doing that? And what are your returns? And what's your reasoning? What are you seeing because maybe an element of that could get translated back to your investment strategy? Yeah, totally. So I'm trying to think I kind of want to take a hard veer
but it is still in the money realm, and it's also a bit of a taboo topic. I know that you have been working on a motherhood journey.
And I would love for you to share some of your financial and personal experiences around that, because it's one more thing that women don't really get access to hearing about. And I think it would be really cool. Whatever you feel comfortable sharing, of course, yeah. And hopefully, no tears are shed because it inevitably happens. It's mine. It's
when we talk about this topic, of course, but yeah, I'm happy to share. And this is one of those things that I have found. And this is just my own personal preference. But in being more open and honest about it, I have gotten so much back from people in terms of support, but also companionship in like, Oh, I had no idea you're going through that I did, I went through this, but I didn't share it. And I'm just like, so proud of you for sharing it. And so all of those conversations have been so great. But yeah, so you know, I said, when I when I want when I turned 30, I was like I want to become a mother. Not today, but you know, here in the near future. And so I kind of set up and made a bunch of decisions in order to get there. And so my husband and I, we started trying in March of 2020. So it's been, you know, roughly a year and a half, a little bit shy of that. And I was one of those naive women that thought, Okay, this is gonna happen quick for us. And when I want something, or like when I make a decision I get I'm pretty firm on it, and I start to make things happen in order to achieve it. And so this whole process has been such a test for me, because I realized I can't just like work my, I can't just put hard work into this. And it and it happened. I mean, it's like completely out of my control, for the most part. But so we you know, we started then we tried for, you know, roughly nine months before we started enlisting help, I went to a Fertility Center here in Austin. And since then, it's been really challenging. I mean, we've had two failed, IU eyes, one canceled transfer, one failed transfer. And that's kind of where we are now. And so I literally never thought that, that would be me. But I'm so grateful, because had I not kind of gone through all these life changes, that we're all really spurred by getting in charge of my finances, I just feel so much more capable to be able to tackle this. And I do really acknowledge first and foremost, like, there are so many women out there that maybe getting help with fertility is like not an option for them financially. And I feel so lucky and so fortunate that that it's not even an issue for me. And that is one piece of stress that is is an existing on top of all the other stresses that happens through this journey with you know, and even going through a pandemic with it. So, so yeah, I mean, it that's really impacted my mindset around money to I mean, all of a sudden, I realized and I know Allison had a great podcast I listened to on kind of the money behind IVF. For me, personally, we have spent almost $32,000 out of pocket so far, and we're still not even close to being done. And unfortunately, the way it is in corporate America these days, I don't have a single penny that is covered by my insurance. And so all of that is out of pocket. I don't qualify for any sort of like rebates or programs, which you know, is understandable because of my income level. So I just feel fortunate that I had a bucket of money in my high yield savings account that was tagged for a downpayment for an investment property. And when all this stuff started happening, I just picked it up and said you know what, fuck it that's now our fertility fund and we just got to reprioritize because that's no longer a priority for us like we have to start this family we want to start this family and so that dream is on hold for now and we're just going to pick that up and move it over. And I feel really fortunate to be able to have done that. I appreciate you so much for sharing that and the numbers and the experience behind it. I think that it is truly wonderful to hear you say that the financial stress on top of all of the other feelings that come with going through this journey doesn't have to be there. I do love hearing you say like we had a we had a savings bucket that was for this goal and we transfer that goal to one that is more important to us. That is literally what I want for all women. I want them to say okay, I'm planning this but if things change or reprioritize then I can just transfer this money over to here and you are able to do that and I think that that is so incredible. I also You are the one
Who said to me recently that your motherhood journey started when you started this process. And I thought that was so beautiful to hear, because that's so true. Like you have made your future babies a priority by going through all of this by learning all of what you've learned and doing all of what you've done to like, get to where you are. And I have no doubt that you guys are going to be the best parents, when that becomes hopefully very soon for you. So to wrap up this episode, Renee is the shit she has doubled. Worth started a business change jobs, making less at first, but then earning it back up with her talents and her side hustle abilities, made a ton of financial friends and accountability partners and started her motherhood journey with IVF. So if there was kind of one thing that you could share, or just anything you left out that you would want someone who's starting their personal finance journey to now.
Here's your moment. What, what do they need to know? Oh, man, yeah, it's so important. Well, for me, I would say, you know, and we talked a lot about this in our last last podcast, too, but it's so important to ask for help early. And to, to jump in early. I mean, this is a long game. Hopefully, we are all alive for a very long time with lots of babies and grandchildren, if that's what you want, maybe pets, or land. But it's all about really the small daily discipline and habits that ultimately land you in a spot where you wake up, and you're like, holy shit, I couldn't have dreamed that I would be here. And I really look forward to the day when, you know, we're old and gray and can look back and just so grateful for everything. So I and I think it's important to start early. And it's important to say it out loud, and to find someone that will listen, because the more likely you are to say it out loud, the more likely you are to put together all the pieces to actually manifest that dream. And so, you know, I always look back on that day when when you were like, what would you do? If you had a if you got fired tomorrow, and I said, I guess I would take pictures with people.
And fast forward. And it's, it's really crazy to see where I am. So start small, start early, say it out loud. And then go back and celebrate your wins and make sure you have people cheering you on along the way. I love that. And I'll just also re emphasize the other thing you said about having discipline because building wealth. It is a discipline. You can't be reactive, you have to set a goal, create an action plan, put systems in place, and stay the course. And you have done that. So congratulations on all your successes. There are many more to come. I'm excited to do this pod again in two years and hear that you're already at 2 million. So other than Why thank you, Renee, I thank you so much Allegra. 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.