Financial Feminist - 91. Understanding Hidden Financial Challenges for Military and Nomadic Families with Lauren Taylor

Episode Date: May 30, 2023

If you were part of a military family, or a family who moved frequently growing up, you know all too well the strain it can have on your personal relationships and your financial life. To talk more about unique factors affecting military and other nomadic families, Tori sat down with Lauren Taylor, founder of PCS Pay-It-Forward Inc, to learn about programs as they currently exist and what’s being done at the local and national levels to support military families. Lauren also dives into her business as a marketing educator, talking through how she started her online business as a way to earn money as a military spouse and how she’s built an audience of 100,000 on TikTok. Read transcripts, learn more about our guests and sponsors, and get more resources at https://herfirst100k.com/start-here-financial-feminist-podcast Not sure where to start on your financial journey? Take our FREE money personality quiz! https://herfirst100k.com/quiz Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We are all facing the same struggles. Our families are all facing the same obstacles. And the better that we can create solutions for us, but kind of by us, because we're the only ones who really understand that, you know, the better off we're all gonna be. Hello. Hello, financial feminists.

Welcome back to the show. We are so thankful you're here and we're hoping you're enjoying what feels like the official kickoff to summer in the end of May. I live in Seattle, where we've had a beautiful last week and a half of sun, but Junuary is coming, which is what we call, of course, June, where it feels like January, and it's not summer until July 5th. But I'm hoping it might feel a little different this year. If you are new here, welcome. My name is Tori.

I am the founder of Her First 100K, obviously the host of this podcast, the author of the New York Times bestselling book, also called Financial Feminist, available wherever books are sold. And I'm here to fight the patriarchy by making you rich. If you're an oldie but a goodie, welcome back. We're excited to see you back. A bunch of exciting things are happening this summer, including the launch of our newly rebranded Stock Market School, which I'm super excited about. It is a year of investing education.

It is live monthly coaching taught by me, the only place that I offer coaching anymore, workshops around step-by-step investing, around managing the stock market, around growing your wealth, around what is a Roth IRA and a 401k and how do I use them? So if you're looking to get started investing, but you're looking for a community and a person to walk you through it step by step, well, welcome. We're excited to have you at Stock Market School. We got the link in our show notes. This past weekend was Memorial Day weekend, which is a time in the United States where we remember those who have bravely served and lost their lives in service to our country. We thought it would be great to talk to someone who is familiar with the military family life. And if you've never met

anybody in the military, you might not realize how often their lives can feel tumultuous and in constant, ever-changing mode. So between deployments and relocations, it can be very difficult to find stability either as someone who is in the military or as a military spouse or a member of a military family. So we brought in Lauren Taylor to talk about her time as a military spouse and how she built a business to support military families. Lauren Taylor is a successful entrepreneur in the real estate industry. She is the co-owner and founder of Pay It Forward Today, Inc., which is currently the fastest growing military relocation network for military families in America. Her savvy homebuyer education program has helped over 12,000 individuals purchase homes in the last three years. And she specializes in organic

lead generation through content marketing and recently began to utilize her proven strategies and skills to help real estate entrepreneurs grow on TikTok. In 2022, Taylor was recognized for her work as 125 award winner by Success Magazine. And in 2023, Lauren released her first podcast entitled All In with LT that focuses on the strategy side of content creation for businesses and features high level entrepreneurs and business owners using video content to grow their brands. I follow Lauren as an expert in the online space. Her content is so helpful for anybody trying to grow an online business. So regardless of whether you're a military spouse, a military family or not, this is super impactful. Her work is super impactful.

And if you're someone who just moves around a lot for your work, if you're like a traveling nurse, if you are someone who has a lot of like relocations or you're choosing to actually move. If you have a spouse who travels often, this episode is going to be helpful for you to better understand those challenges and how to work through them. We also get into how Lauren decided to build her own business so that she could create a network and income no matter where they're stationed next. So again, if you've considered starting a small business, this episode is a great starting place. So again, if you've considered starting a small business, this episode is a great starting place. Let's get into it.

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like, I am very bad about actually taking, not only taking time off, but when I'm off, I'm like, oh, I'll just check this one thing. Or like, I'm just in the habit of doing it. I'm like, you open Instagram. And then it's like, oh, I can answer this question and somebody's comment in two seconds. Right. And you end up like, doesn't feel like work, but it is work. And so I am actually hoping to journal on my flight tomorrow because I'm spending the first week in Cabo, which would be fun. And I'm literally just going to be like, okay, what does this boundary actually look like? How are we going to honor these boundaries? Good for you. It's important. It's hard. It's hard.

You know, it's hard. It is hard, especially because you're called to serve, right? There's so many people that you want to help. So to not answer people's questions feels like, yeah. I do it for a reason. I'm obsessed with it. I love it. And it's also like, it's draining all the time. And then I like, I pendulum swing really hard where I'm like, this is great. And then I pendulum swing to like, this is awful. I'm deleting Instagram. I'm never, I want no one to know anything. I am in a black hole. And like, that's not great. Yeah. I was telling my, my, my agents I was working with, there's this really strange space as your business grows. That's like you grow so fast that your business almost outgrows you. And then you as a person that you're at right now, right. Have to catch up to like where your

business is. And this is very strange, uncomfortable feeling of wanting to walk away of wanting to just shut down completely. But that's actually just like the next phase of growth. And it's just uncomfortable. Sounds about right. Cool. Thank you for psychoanalyzing. At least it's normal. Thinking about that for a while. Cool. Lots to a lot of time on vacation to think about that. Tell me a little bit about your background and particularly with the 2008 housing crisis, a subject we all like talking about. Especially right now, everyone wants to talk about it. I actually, I love talking about it because I just came into the industry of really fresh eyes. I

graduated college in 2008 and I had no idea what I wanted to do. I was a communications English major and I wanted to build a career. So I got kind of hoodwinked into a financial, you know, planning interview group interview, which is like kind of maybe a red flag, but ultimately I went for it. I went for it and I get my, my financial services licenses. And the day that I passed my life insurance exam, which was the last exam I needed to work with clients, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac got taken over by the Fed. And I walked into the office and it was just complete pandemonium. And I've never been in that environment before, nor in college, I really understand the magnitude of what that actually meant. But for years, I sat across from clients, helping them kind of piece

together their financial future. There was a lot of common themes there that have really dictated my career. A couple of them being that people who have purchased homes, they felt like they signed documents they didn't understand because they wanted to ride the roller coaster, right? They didn't ask the right questions, let alone know the questions to ask. There was a lot of responsibility on the mortgage industry and on realtors who hadn't properly educated their clients, or at least they felt like they were properly educated. And that really sat with me. But honestly, the craziest thing that came out of that time is that we would like, I would sit down with someone and be like, okay,

what do you want to accomplish in five years? What do you accomplish 10, 15, you know, you know, short-term, long-term goals. And then almost every time the number one goal, no matter what that person's experience was, was that they wanted to be a homeowner. They could have been upside down in their mortgage and they're like, well, we're going to figure this out and we're going to get this settled. And then, yeah, we got to start saving for our next down payment. And that to me was really eye opening. And I think that there's been a shift around that in the last

10 years or 15 years or however long it's been. But that really dictated when I transitioned out of finance and I had my kid, my oldest son and my husband was military. And I was like, well, do I want to still do finance? I was like, no. I was like, I want to help people buy that house. I want to be on the front end of that, not on the back end of that. And maybe I can change their fate a little bit that way. Do you feel like it's the culture of you are not successful, and I'm putting that in quotes, as an American unless you are a homeowner? Yeah, I think there's definitely a conversation about that. I work with a lot of real estate agents. And one of the things that drives me crazy is the shaming around homeownership.

If you don't choose to purchase a home, here's the reality is that purchasing a home is a great wealth building tool. But do you think people are just sitting around being like, I have the money I choose not to like, that's a very small segment of the world, right? But most other people, I'm they're like trying to build a down payment, we're trying to get our credit scores in a place we're trying to get our student loans in a place where that's even feasible. So shame does not help that it's education and support its resources, its programs. And so that to me is a big bone that I have to pick with our realtor community is that create resources that actually help people don't shame people who are trying to do their best. Yeah, I couldn't agree more. And I am in that small

majority that is like I am choosing to rent because it fits my lifestyle right now but also now starting to talk i literally have a conversation with my realtor tonight of like okay is it time we start looking more seriously so yes well i wanted to talk to you because i know your history with dave ramsey and there was a tweet what was the tweet what did he tweet this time oh no it, it was, if you just save $100 a month for the next 40 years, you'll have $1.7 million. It's the exact tweet. You'll have $1.7 million. So don't tell me that you won't be wealthy or rich. And I'm sure at some point we can flash that across the screen, but I'm literally sitting here going back to my financial advisor days. I'm sure that you could. And I'm like, okay, well, inflation is 4%. So you're going to

have $1.7 million in 40 years. More than 45% of Americans over the age of 55 have nothing saved for retirement right now. So like 1.7 million, nothing to sneeze at. Great amount of money. Also, that assumes you have $100 a month to save. It assumes you know how to save it and really invest it because he's not just putting that in a savings account. And yes, 1.7 million is not going to be today's 1.7 million, which was definitely not 30 years ago is 1.7 million. Yeah, so I took it all the way I was like trying to Okay, so if we have 1.7 million, we're taking off 3%. And then my brain goes to,

if I were invested in the real estate, because I do both, right? So I have financial investments myself that me and my husband manage. And then we also do have a couple of investment properties, which is such a blessing. We've been able to do that. But then I go to that point and I didn't hit the end where I could like definitively prove one or the other. But I think the important things that comes out of it is that there's multiple ways to reach your goals, but thinking about them earlier is better than waiting because you have more runway and room for error and also room for success. People who listen to this podcast religiously, they will have heard this so many times. Time is way more important than the amount of money

when it comes to investing. Absolutely. Even if you just get started now and it's like 20 bucks, 50 bucks, 100 bucks one time, let's say like once every, I don't know, year, that is still better than waiting to start when you quote have more money or when you are making more money or when you are like, I do the misconceptions in my book. We have an entire chapter on investing and like the first half is just like all the misconceptions, which is like, rich people, that's the only people that invest. And I'm like, no, that's how you get rich. Or like, I have time to wait. And I'm like, actually, you don't. So yeah, couldn't agree more. We need time on our side. I remember my high school teacher. Gosh, I wish I remembered his

name at this very moment. I'd give him a shout out. He told us about like the incredible power of compounding interest, right? And not only that, like the Roth IRA had just come out. And told us about like the incredible power of compounding interest. Right. And not only that, like the Roth IRA had just come out. And so he's like, let me tell you about this incredible thing. So I'm working at Yen Chim Garden. Shout out to all my San Diego peeps and literally making, you know, $8 an hour, but I'm like trying to max out Roth IRA. That's just kind of always been my mindset. That's amazing. Yeah. But isn't that neat? Cause it's like, you know, we hit, some of us don't get that information until we're what? 30 so many people are the like they're 45 and they're in our email being like i've never heard of a roth ira or like no one's ever taught me and that's unfortunately totally

normal do you feel like that's a failure of the education system because like really okay what do you how where does that fall i I mean, the answer is more complicated than that. Again, plug it. But I have a whole podcast episode with my friends who run Rich and Regular, and we were talking about like the fallacy of financial literacy, where I think we as a society think, okay, you know, if there was a high school class about money, or if there was even a college class about money, that would 100% help. But I can tell you when I was a 16-year-old learning about pre-calculus, I learned as much as I needed to know for the test. I hopefully aced the test. Do I remember any pre-calculus today? No, of course not. It's

not relevant to my life. When you're 16, now it sounds like you are one of the outliers that it would help, right? But when you're 16 and you hear about a Roth IRA, you are not making... I mean, some people aren't making any money when they're 16. I had... My afterschool job, I worked at a music store and I was making, I don't know, whatever minimum wage was, right? And I was putting that money in my college savings fund. And that was just to pay for college, basically, and to have a little bit of money to do with friends on the weekends. There was no sort of concept of that. I truly believe that it's more of a systemic problem. And it's also, if you don't have family who teaches

you about money, that's more of the issue than school. Then we get into the question of who teaches it. Because right now, the financial literacy that is taught in schools or churches is Dave Ramsey's financial education, which I would argue, yes, is beneficial in some ways and has way bigger of a harsher, like a worse impact on some people, most people, then you get into the nuanced conversations of like, who teaches it? How is it funded? How is it taught? Is it taught as like bootstraps narrative of like, if you're not rich, that's because you're not working hard enough? Or are we talking about systemic oppression when we talk about money? So I think yes, it would help. However, that's the I think the fallacy is that

if we just educated kids about money in school or in college, like that would solve everything. And I'm like, no, not even close. The thing that I love about your book and what we actually just like jumped over both you and I is the blessing that you and I had that I could take that money and put it in the right there. And you could take that money and save it for college. Whereas a lot of our counterparts in different parts of the country have to take that money and bring it home to feed their family. Totally. A hundred percent of privilege. A hundred percent. Yeah. I loved how much you talked about that in the book, because I feel like that's something that's not discussed. And it is like, you know, starting from a different place, there has to be some sort of account, like some sort of recognition

or awareness around that. And then also like, what can we do to level the playing field? I don't have the right answer, but I love this becoming a conversation because it's necessary. Well, I mean, it's not, there's no easy answer and I don't have it, but it's like the answer to financial equality is solving racism and solving sexism and like paid family leave and higher minimum wage. And we actually just right before this did an episode with a woman who wrote a book called tipped. And she was talking about like, you know, this, this minimum wage that is, uh, I can't remember the word she used, and this is my own fault. But basically, there's plenty of states that if you are a restaurant worker, you make $2 an hour

as the minimum wage, and then it's in theory adjusted with tips. But that's bullshit. And it has to come from systemic change and systemic alteration more than it comes from an individual person's experience. Yes, education would be helpful. But I think it is the kind of like blanket. I think because it's such like a black or white answer that people cite it all the time of like, oh, we just need financial education in schools, right? We just need a, you know, personal finance 101 class in a school and that will solve everything. All of these problems are nuanced, but yet folks like Dave Ramsey do not want to live in the gray because the gray is sticky and there is no answer. It's hard to sell books in the gray, Tori.

I was just going to say he wants to look like a godlike figure who's come down to solve everybody's problems. He is the guru. I'm a financial expert. There's plenty, I think think that I have to say. Of course, that's helpful. That's the reason the show exists. It's the reason I got a book deal. I'm also not the person who's going to be like, everything I have to say is scripture. And it is the only way you can do it. It is like a diet, right? He's telling you, oh, if you don't follow my system, and you're not rich, you didn't do it correctly, or you didn't do it hard enough or you didn't want it bad enough and it's just like like impossible diets and cleanses it's like oh if you drank celery juice and only celery juice for seven days and you feel like shit then you didn't drink

you didn't process it correctly or you didn't drink it in the morning on an empty stomach you know and so yeah i could talk forever about this but that's, I think the fallacy of it is it's like, I don't remember anything from my high school class. Like I remember my high school English classes cause I loved them and I loved my teachers, but that's what I wanted to learn about. I don't know how many, let's say 14 to even 21 year olds are going to be like, yes, personal finance, and especially with a curriculum that is so shame based, or even like religious based. Yeah, absolutely. I don't know how to transition out of that. That's my like, and that's all I have to say about that. Yeah, there you go. Yeah, it is my like thing that gets me riled up. Because again, I think financial education,

unfortunately, is a privilege. And we're trying to solve it with this like one size fits all but then it's all of these other questions again like how is this funded who's teaching it what's being taught because i imagine just like sex ed right the uh it's going to be different depending on the school depending on um the racial makeup of that school depending on the funding of that school, it's going to be very, very different advice. I went to Catholic school, it was abstinence only sex ed. What sex? Yeah. Yeah. What is it? Don't have it. You were saying that you wanted to be on the more fun side of real estate, right? Of like the anticipation and the excitement. Was it just about the experience of being able to connect with people in that way rather than being on the other side that was like depressing like what got you interested in being an agent

and especially like transferring kind of careers so number one a need okay so i got married my husband was a officer in the navy we were living off of one income we thought we were going to be so fine we bought our first house which was from an investment company and we were going to be so fine. We bought our first house, which was from an investment company. And we were represented by the agent who represented the investment company. We were talked out of using our VA home loan because it wasn't in our best interest. And then when we closed the deal, I called him the day after we closed. And I was like, Hey, like, I have a couple of questions. And he was kind of like, look, this ride is over. Like we're closed. And, you know, he represented the seller and we did get probably a deal because of that. But when it came time to gosh, story in that house, I left our

heater and our pool on and we have $700 heating bill. Like I came down in the morning and like drank a cup of coffee and it was like the heating you could like see the steam coming off because it was outdoor yeah yeah yeah yeah and have a cover on it i grew up in a house with a pool and my dad is so frugal and was like we heat this for like three days out of the year and then he has the cover on it oh yeah whole thing yeah so a 700 electric bill a heating electric bill in southern california was enough to like really give us a financial wake- up call as a young family. And I was like, I have to do something. So I decided to get my real estate license, because I, you know, had that alignment, I had learned from these people I sat across from, and I was like, I just want to educate,

come from a place of service. I learned that, you know, military people want to work with military people. And so I was like, I can then serve our community in this way. We were shopping, shopping at the Dollar Tree for Christmas and for food. And my parents would bring us Costco every other week. And that was probably a little bit more than they would care to admit at this point how much they were like propping us up. And so I got my license and I was like, I'm gonna sell one house. And my goal is like, I going to sell a house so we don't have to shop at Dollar Tree. And then maybe, you'll love this, maybe I'll get to max out Roth IRA. I was obsessed with this evidently. I did really well my first year.

Southern California has great price points. I made like $300,000 my first year and I didn't even know that type of money existed. So my husband was deployed when I got my license. So he then came home to a very different... We were shopping at Dollar Tree to making great money. Now what do you do? So during that time, I actually started a relocation program for our military families. There was just a gap in the market. There was people who are willing to help military families buy because they get a great commission check. Base housing took care of them when they were living on base housing. But if you came and you were going to rent, there was this huge gap of service. And what happened

was the FBI came out and was basically like, hey, there's a lot of scams right now on Facebook Marketplace, on Zillow. They didn't have the cross-referencing they did. And they're targeting our community because you're coming from afar. You're feeling rushed to make a decision. It could be gone. It looks better than you think it is and send us your deposit and it's yours. And our families are showing up and that property sold six months ago. And that was the listing photos that were reused. And there is no way we can ever get your money back. And for a lot of our military families, that is their total savings. Like PCS moves cost a lot of money. They cost like five grand. That is not like easy money to come by. So I started San Diego PCS Pay

It Forward. I was like, if I can put all of these people in one space, then I can maybe help solve this problem. And then I can get everyone involved in it, right? It's like, hey, this is an impact to their entire community. So can we all share rentals? If you see a rental sign, who'd be willing to do a drive-by to see if it's legit and people would post signs in the group. And it just kind of went crazy. It grew from there. It grew my team, which was wonderful. I always tell people the pay it forward part I love because look for every one house I sell through that program, 10 other families get the help that they need to find the house that they need. So it's like a mutually beneficial win for us as an agent and also for our members, our military coming in. So we expanded that in 2018.

And now we serve over a hundred thousand military families. And we're super, super blessed to have the amazing community of military families who show up every single day to like serve and answer questions and post rentals. And it's really a group effort. We're just proud to lead it. That's amazing. Well, and that's what I wanted to talk to you for the majority of this time about, especially like your experience as a military spouse. And it sounds like, you know, when your husband was deployed, you were in the reality that I think plenty of military spouses are in. And when we pulled our research, military spouses, overwhelmingly women, and the unemployment rate for military spouses is 22%. And it has been for like the past decade. So what are some of the reasons that military spouses have a more inflated unemployment percentage? And

like, what was that personal experience for you? Like of, okay, husband's shipping off. What is my reality? What is my day to day look like? Yeah. So I think the primary role of the military spouse is to create stability for the family because you're, they're gone. You can move at any moment. And there is an emotional aspect of raising a family in the military of like picking your family up and moving. They don't have lifelong friends, right? So the primary role really becomes stabilizing the home and making sure that everyone is emotionally well.

I think that there's a big gap in employment largely because of the relocation. Now, this was a lot worse, I will say, pre-pandemic, okay? This was before people were open to doing remote. And so when you walked in for an interview, or when you came in for an interview, and they found out you're in the service, you know, they ask you, Oh, how long have you been in town? Or, you know, maybe it's just a big military town in general, and they can kind of see it in you. It's a red flag for them. It's kind of like hiring someone who's pregnant. Like, how long is this person going to be here? And that became the stipulation. I'm a poor

one to three years into training you, which is arguably what it takes to train a great employee who knows their job A to Z, and then you're going to ship out. And that's not 100% definite, but that's enough fear for the employer to keep them from hiring, from choosing someone who's going to be there longer. Yeah. And I think that transition is really difficult. And I imagine you have children, right? And so I think that in a more traditional household, if two parents work,

they're probably going to be at home at night, right? Both of them are coming home. Was that a conscious decision of like, I'm going to run my own business to have the flexibility to stay home? 1000%. So I remember one morning, it was like 5am. And my husband's like stumbling around like the bedroom, like getting ready for work. I'm like, what are you doing? He's literally crawling on his hands and knees. And like, what is wrong with you? And he's like, I think I threw out my back. And I was like, you can't drive. Like you have to drive 45 minutes. Like that's not safe. And he's like, if I don't show up, he's MIA. It all hell breaks loose. And so there is not flexibility on the other side. I envy all the military families who say like, oh, and then we put in for vacation. I'm like,

we never got a vacation we put in for. So everyone's experience is different. But yeah, so I wanted the flexibility. I wanted to be able to be there for my kids I also wanted the the larger income opportunity I'm always been kind of one of those people that I would define as like works twice as hard as I think everyone a lot of people say they work twice as hard but that's something I identified with so I really didn't want to be in a place where my income was going to be limited to like you get paid this per hour so I was like if I'm gonna naturally apply myself and that is something I wish more people knew about running their own business if you're someone who like naturally applies yourself and it's like you get paid this per hour. So I was like, if I'm a naturally apply myself, and that is something I wish more people knew about running their own business. If you're someone who like

naturally applies yourself, and it's like, you just feel like you're kind of taken for granted, and they all the projects kind of fall back on you, you really should consider starting your own business. Because that is the opportunity there where you are going to get have those income opportunities that you just don't have when someone's like trading you time for dollar. Totally. Yeah. What financial factors are affecting military families specifically? BAH, basic housing allowance. So talk to me about that. What is that? So two things. We got a pay raise this year, was super exciting people tell you it was the greatest pay raise in like a decade or two or three or whatever and i'll pull those statistics for every military spouse who's about to message me and be like she didn't even know the number yeah congratulations we got like a four percent raise like the most in the last 30 years i was

like which is crazy that's crazy that's like cost of living adjustment i know i know and then so we got the raise which which was great it's also your pay is based on your rank so it impacts everyone differently it's based on your rank it's also based on whether or not you have kids so your marital status so there's a lots of ins and outs of it wait you're paid more if you have children you are paid more if you have dependents so you so people ask like oh why are we all these young military people who are married well number one if you're in a lot of branches if you're not married you live in the barracks and you don't get paid as much so they will marry each other just to get out of the barracks i mean i had i'm also like getting stationed together i went to a school

that had an rotc program and there were a lot of weddings, like spring semester, senior year, so that they could, you know, be deployed together or go to the same training together. Yeah. Yeah. So there's two pay things. There's the basic pay and then there's a housing allowance. So the housing allowance is based on where you are stationed at. And so the interesting thing about that is that there is not a global view of what that looks and feels like. Let me explain. If you complain in Southern California that last year in Los Angeles, the housing prices went up by 30%, but BAH went down by 2%. Those are not exact numbers, but there was like a decrease when the housing market exploded. It just made no sense, right? They will tell you, well, this is like a

local issue. It's decided locally. That's not what we're seeing everywhere. Tori, I don't think that there's someone who has a more global view of what's happening in the military housing market than our program, because we have a hundred military spouses and veterans who are tapped into every market. And I think that they rely on that as a way to not implement change across the board. Across the board, almost every single market, we are no longer competitive. Our kids cannot go to the quality of schools and educations they used to be able to go to five, seven years ago. And this isn't about going to the best schools. This is about maintaining the quality of education and the areas of which our families are able to live. Seven years ago, very possible that a family could live in a place where you're looking at like a four or like eight or a nine or

a 10 school on greatschools.com. Now we're looking closer to three, fours and fives. It really depends on your area, but the basic housing allowance as well as the pay have really not kept up with what we've seen in the market and what we've seen on inflation. Yeah. And there's layers to that, right? It's like, let me peel back the layers of me doing a TikTok about that. And then tons of military families hitting me in the comments like, I was fine when I served 15 years ago. Absolutely. Things have changed. It's ever-changing and it is a difficult beast to manage. I think we've tried to take a simplified process to fix a complicated problem. And I think

that we need- Like we were talking about before. Yeah. Yeah. And we need more information around it. My agents, my ambassadors, they are so dedicated to our space. Each one of them reaches out to their housing office and they're like, how can I help you better understand the local market? Because they have to submit a report every year that then impacts the BAH rates. The problem is that person sometimes isn't really tapped into what's happening around that base. And then there's a disconnect between what happens versus what's actually needed to be to be successful. But we are doing our best we are. I want to sound futile because we have some great

advocates in Congress, we have a number of programs that we've been reaching out to, it's important to acknowledge when shit's hard. i feel like again if somebody's listening and this is their reality like i've learned with financial advice too is it's like sometimes the just like rose colored you know the unicorn that's shitting butterflies is like not what people need to hear it's just like this is yeah this is the reality i don't necessarily have a solution right right but hey we're working I mean, the other thing is like military housing is really tough right now. A couple years ago, there started to be a lot of stories of because they moved to privatized businesses to manage a lot of the military housing. Okay. And so there was a lot of maintenance that was going on done a lot of mold, a lot of burst pipes, a lot of medical issues,

like we have a ton of class action lawsuits right now from people who have medical issues because of what they were experiencing in base housing. And we had some focus on it from the government for a little bit of time. And ironically, Elizabeth Warren came out and was like, we need better accountability. And literally that week, the barracks at Fort Bragg,

which by the way is managed by the government, not managed by privatized housing, like mold everywhere, like people getting sick. And I'm like, you're right. We need better accountability from both parts. It can't, it's not one of the others, no finger pointing here. And that's a huge issue that we're facing right now is that even the housing that's provided to military families, a good portion of it is not, not safe. military families, a good portion of it is not safe. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, my question was going to be, what can we at the individual level do to solve it? And it sounds like your business is the step or one step of trying to navigate that. Yeah. I think that if I had advice for a military family who was looking to relocate, the hardest thing is that they have like an end date, right?

We have to be there in six weeks. So I can't write anything out. There's none. And I think that maybe that's why I'm an advocate for home ownership. I think the VA home loan is probably one of the greatest wealth building tools that's been provided to our military families. That's why I was muted when you were talking about the the VA I like gasped when they were like they yeah they told us not to take I was like so let's talk about this though because I feel like sometimes people get talked out of it so you and I come from a standpoint we know like saving like 15 to 20 percent or even three percent right even saving three percent is like a massive hurdle for most people hard especially I live in seattle you're in nash

like these places are so expensive and i yeah i was again i'm talking to my real estate agent tonight and i was just like this is gonna be interesting i'm like how 900 000 for a two bedroom two bath okay all right okay so while the average person has to save like three and a half percent and then closing costs let's say closer to 5% unless they get the salary. And then PMI if you don't have the full 20%. Yeah. Yep. So all of that takes into consideration.

But what it does is creates like a natural threshold for homeownership, right? That, you know, the majority of people, that will be the struggle the rest of their life. And the longer that they wait to purchase a home, the more difficult it becomes because they have to keep up with the rental and prices. And so there's not as much disposable income to save. And so the 0% down VA home loan, I mean, you can negotiate for the seller to pay your closing costs. A couple of years ago, it was a very real thing that I was helping families buy homes in San Diego and they would get refunded their $2,000 that they had to put in as an earnest money deposit, which is incredible.

But with the market shift, obviously those trends change, guys. So if that wasn't your experience, I'm sorry. But that's why the VA home loan is so powerful for our military families because it removes that threshold that everyone else is facing. And you don't have to buy rurally like you do with the USDA loan. So I would just sincerely consider it as someone, if you want to control your space, if you're even looking at potentially a long-term investment, we have families who house hack, who literally like move station to station and who purchase a house and then rent it out to another military family after they leave. If you have, I'm going to speak directly to people right now. If you have a rental near a military installation, please message our page. We

have great military families who want to rent from you. I love it. So I grew up in Lakewood, Washington or like Tacoma, Washington, but went to school in Lakewood and Lakewood is where the Fort base or the joint base Lewis McCord Air Force base and now army base is. And it was like a ton of military families like at my school. And yeah, they would come for a few years and typically leave. I think one thing too, that is, and I imagine you have so much to say about this is really difficult is I remember being a kid and watching, you know, new kids come in and kids leave. And even when I was seven, eight, nine years old, realizing like how hard that must be to come into a new place, to navigate new friendships. And especially, you know, as a kid, I understood that. But as an adult too, you're lacking that community. You're lacking potentially that support.

Maybe you don't have family in the area. You probably don't. You don't have friends who live here. So how can we build community or how can military families build community and how can you combat that feeling of loneliness or lack of access to resources? One of my favorite things, and this was not the reason why we started this program, but the byproduct of this program is that when new members come in, we welcome them. I always tell my ambassadors, look, if you walked into a party and no one said, hey, I'm so glad you're here, how long would you stay or how welcome would you feel? So yeah. Thanks for the invite, I guess. And the coolest things are happening in the common story. It would be like, Oh my God, we went to flight school together. Oh, you guys are coming here. I'm so

excited. Like tear Lauren Taylor's heart apart. Like the best pay it forward experience is watching people reconnect in, in our communities because they're all run through Facebook groups. So number one, get plugged in early and be honest about what you're facing. So come from a place in the group. Now you can do like anonymous posts you used to not be able to do that. But I would say, say what you're facing. Say, guys, I'm scared. My kids are struggling right now. They need friends who has boys, you know, five, seven and eight. We are all facing the same struggles.. We are all facing the same struggles. Our families are all facing the same obstacles. And the better that we can create solutions for us, you know, kind of by us, because we're

the only ones who really understand that, you know, the better off we're all going to be. So I always encourage people to get plugged in early and to tell people what you need, tell people what you're struggling with, because nine times out of 10, there's someone in the group who is willing to be that solution for you because someone else was that solution for them. Or no one was that solution for them. And that's what they prayed for too. Yeah. As a military family, how are you navigating just knowing, okay, there is the VA loan option, or there is this resource. Where do you get plugged into like the financial resources or community for military

families? So that one's tough, too, because the military has been very hands off. They don't really want to champion like a privatized company. And I don't really know. So there is a couple of companies who have resources, right, who have big names in the military community, Navy Fed, you got USAA. But beyond that, there's not a lot of local support or resources. There is some influencers who teach specifically

on military. Yeah, I don't know if I have a perfect solution for that because they've taken such a hands-off approach. It's created such a gap in the market. And that's the one that we stepped in to fill with real estate. But in terms of investing, there's such a limited information. No one's sitting you down to tell you about your TSP. No one's sitting you down to tell you what you should be invested in, how much you should save. I mean, when you make that point, no one's doing that for the general civilian population either. Right. And that's kind of, it's like, rounded back to our conversation about financial literacy, but like, no one's doing that either. So yeah, yeah, it's hard. Yeah, it is. It is tough.

But that is, you know, we serve a very interesting gap because we're not a Navy Fed. We're not USAA, right? And so what a lot of people won't know, especially if you go through one of those home buying programs is that they charge the agent 35% of their commission ish. Don't send me a letter ish. Okay. But this was a big conversation for me when we expanded pay it forward is that I am one referral model as an agent who was serving our families. I was like, I don't want charging people 30, 30, 35%. I don't feel like that best serves a member. I feel like I was in a position where a very, very well-known, very, very well-known company was like, okay, great. And that's just going to be 50%. I'm a military spouse and my husband employed, and I have two babies on my hip

and nursing my newborn. And I'm like, what makes you think I have the capacity to help and to leave and to serve for half of what I would make if I made this relationship on my own. So that is something I feel like military families have to be aware of is that when you go through one of those programs, sometimes you'll get like a rebate, which is great. But like I used to tell people, look, buying a house is not really the time to make money. Like you're choosing an agent. God, I'm going to get so much bad feedback, but I'm here for you guys. You're choosing an agent based on the recommendation of a company who's charging that agent 35%, which means that agent has less leverage to actually help you with the transaction, which a lot of agents are willing to do.

And not only that, you're doing it for like $1,500. When I'm negotiating your deal, $1,500 is like a spit in the bucket. We're talking about 10, 20 grand. So in terms of what a solid negotiator can do on your behalf. So I just would recommend that people ask, a negotiator can do on your behalf. So I just would recommend that people ask, what's the business relationship here? Is this company that you found you through? Are they charging you to work with me? And how does that impact where I fall on your priorities in terms of working with? Because it's just not possible to attract top talent when you're charging people 50% of what it takes them to live. You went into real estate, which is its own way, of course, of building a small business. What were some of the surprising parts about starting

a small business and working for yourself and then to make it even more granular as a military family? What are the challenges to running a business in that environment? Oh, goodness. Okay. So first of all, I think I was very good at selling houses. I was not a great business owner. That was something I had to learn. I didn't have a business degree. So I will tell you, I made great money my first year and I turned to my husband and I was like, I don't think that was worth it. From the person who was shopping a dollar tree, I literally turned to him and was like, maybe I'll just go get like a $50,000 a year salary job. Because I didn't know how to run a business. The idea of

taxes terrified me. Do I payroll myself? You know, all of that, those things that no one talks about that. I just wanted to sell houses. Like I want to be a business owner. Yeah. You're like, I don't know what to do when I get this money. Like, I don't know what to do with it. Yeah, absolutely. So so that took a little bit time to figure out like, and that is a path I try to help new agents take is that how do you become a business owner, not just a realtor is a big transition. And there's a lot of agents who will just live in this like exhausted phase, we have a very high burnout phase, because they ever move into the space of being a business owner. Now on the real estate side, we were only in there for

like seven years. So we are out. We were facing, and this is something a lot of military families face is that my oldest son's from a previous relationship. And so my husband was faced with, okay, if we get moved and his father's still here, then am I going to geo batch? Which means that the dad essentially moves away from the family and the mom holds down the homestead, which is like a very real thing is to keep stability in the house. I'm going to stay here and you're going to go to Virginia or you're going to go wherever you are, or are we going to go to court and try to take him with us? And that's expensive. And when face it with that, you know, kind of crossroad, my husband said,

and he is, this man has a heart of service. Like he is, that is what he was born to do. He said, I can't be away from my boys and I can't take, you know, our oldest son away from his dad. They have a very strong relationship. That is not who we are and what we want to be about. And so he walked, he gave us notice. And so we decided to, to step down and serve in a different way as a family. So there's all these extra layers of running. I have families right now who their husbands get orders, but they have a booming real estate business now. So it's like, do I bring in a spouse to help support me here? Or do I just, okay, that was great.

It was really hard for the first three years. Now I got things running. I'm just going to close up shop and move to the next place. Well, and what a sacrifice we're asking typically women to make, right? And I was thinking about that as you were talking of like, I mean, this is a larger conversation, again, with non-military families too about the domestic labor that typically women do, right? The uncompensated emotional labor, the just holding down the fort, right? The cooking, the cleaning, the housekeeping, child rearing, and the child caretaking. And then you throw in, well, my spouse is never home. And that's not, you know, that's not a, that's literally his job. And then if you have a business

that is booming, yeah, you're exactly right. Do I, do I shutter it? Like the sacrifices you then have to make for your own career, for your your own stability for your own happiness in order to support this other person who and here's the other thing a lot of people say well but then they could just quit or in my comments when i'm like you know we're having these struggles as a family uh to keep up with the inflation and the bh and our military families are hurting people like we'll just quit i'm like we're contractually obligated for the next 10 years we don't get to quit right you don't you don't get to just go get another job to get a better pay raise like you are you're stuck in the system right well and i talk about that at her first center k all the time which is like you have an emergency fund so you can leave a bad situation you don't want to be in anymore but yeah what if you literally

can't leave they can't leave it it. Look, it's not an easy life, but it's also very rewarding. I feel super blessed. Like I, because I've been able, I've been able to see these problems and see this niche and I'm like a natural like problem solver. Right. So at least we've been able to kind of like create a solution for this small sliver. And I know there's people out there like me. I think that the growth of social media has been great for the military community because it's allowed us to connect more, right? You know, 10 years ago when no one, 10, 15 years ago when no one was on Facebook,

you didn't see those connections. You really were like on an island and you did not know who was there until you got there. So that's like a really new phenomenon for our community. And so watching, seeing how that evolves into these like networks of support is also a really neat place to be. Well, and speaking of social media, you had this great quote that likes and follows will not feed my family. Yeah. Can you elaborate on that and why

it's just a really important thing to keep in mind? Yeah. So after, I mean, after I grew Pay It Forward, which has been so successful on Facebook, I stumbled across TikTok and I was a big consumer for quite some time. And then December 2nd of 2021, I was like, you know, I'm going to give this a go. And grew rather quickly, you know, 100,000 followers, which is awesome. Nothing compared to you. But the standards that you set, Tori, are hard to reach. But we grew fast. It was very fast for us, too. And it's something that we're constantly struggling with. So that's

kind. But also, TikTok is both the best part of my business and the worst part of our business. So yeah, yes. And especially in the real estate community, apologies to any realtors that are listening, but we're a little bit of an ego-driven community. If you haven't gotten to know us, we don't really know. There's a good portion of us who don't necessarily know how to develop client relationships without telling people how great we are all the time versus, you know, just like serving and creating solutions

and programs to actually solve problems. And so when I would start talking to agents and they'd be like, oh, I want to grow my community. I want to grow my following. I want to start bringing clients into this process. They'd be like, okay, great. How quickly can I get to 10,000 followers? Or they would buy 10,000 followers. And I'm like, that's a number that means nothing. It means zero things other than your ego. I was actually working with my agents in San Diego last week and she had great, great one-liner just like that. She's like, look, I'm less interested in how it looks. I'm more interested in making money. And I just feel like if we came from a place of service and a place of value,

the likes and followers come. That's how I've always worked on all of my programs, whether it's PCS, pay it forward, give the people what they actually need, solve their problem. I say serve before you sell. That's my thing is serve before you sell. Always, always, always. Even now, this last month, I decided, oh, I'm going to do this on Instagram. I say serve before you sell. That's my thing is serve before you sell. Always, always, always. Even now the last, you know, this last month, I decided, Oh, I'm gonna do this on Instagram. I hit 30,000 followers last night on Instagram. Super exciting. But people are like, what's the secret? I'm like, let's just watch all the videos. I'm telling you exactly what the secrets are. Like, this is it. Like, I literally this is so funny. Classic. We're in a simulation. Literally, somebody asked me yesterday, I did like a linkedin thing of like if you had 60 minutes to ask me any question you wanted like

what would you ask and somebody was like how did you build this business or how did you learn because like you didn't go to school for finance you didn't go to school for business and i'm like i watched other people like people give you master classes in how to create businesses by them running their own businesses and now these are all colleagues of mine. Like Ramit Sethi, I've been watching his business for years. Jenna Kutcher, Tiffany Aliche, all of these people who I would watch and be like, oh, they put their sales pages, they structured them this way, and oh, they have the button there. Oh, and that's the copy they use on the button. Interesting. Or, oh, this person put together an Instagram caption like this. And oh, I see that CTA at the end, a call to action at the end.

Interesting, right? People are giving you MBAs for free. You just have to watch. You just have to watch what's happening. Yes. I had a video, not go super viral this week, but I was trying to explain to people because I'm not the colors behind you you i'm not the overly produced i'm literally text on screen bringing value oh i'm showing up you i am in no makeup and i got a timothy chalamet cardboard cut out behind me like

that's what that's what it's authentic and this is the year of the anti-influencer guys so if you think you have to be something you don't just like come in and be who you are. But I tell people all the time, like you don't have to be this produced version of yourself. You just have to, to show up and be who you are. And there's this natural gap in the market for who you are, but it takes time to show up as that person. So I always recommend when someone's starting to post like three to four small videos a day, I'm not talking YouTube videos. I'm talking like 10 second videos here. And because in video one and two, you show up as a person that you think other people want to see. You show up as the person that you think someone wants to buy a house from, that you think someone wants to hire as a

financial advisor. In videos three or four, you stop caring as much and you start showing up as you. And that's the person I want to see. And that it takes time for people to get to that space. But then once you find that like natural, you that natural gap, the market's waiting for you. Like you, you filled a perfectly natural gap. The market was waiting for you just to step into it. Imagine if you didn't have the courage to do that. How sad that would have been. Well, let's talk about that for a second.

This is like military spouse, military family aside, anybody who's trying to build a business. The thing I hear, and I'm sure you hear all the time is there's somebody doing that already. So I'm not going to. And yeah, there's been plenty of people like I'm not the first person to talk about financial feminism. I'm not the first person to dunk on Dave Ramsey. However, I think I'm the best at it. I'm not the first person to like, most of our advice in the personal finance community is just the same advice, tweaked slightly to talk to a certain group. But you're exactly right. Like if I had sat this one out, because oh, people are, you know, there's plenty of photographers, why would I take photos, there's plenty of writers. I think it wasaniece um who came on yokaro dinero who we had on the show and she was like go to the bread aisle she's like how many right how many brands

of bread are there and then there's english muffins and bagels and there's six different kinds of bagels and yeah so if you're that person who's out there and who's like there's already somebody doing it no there's not there's, I have legitimate, I can legitimately confidently say that I did something first and it sucked. So can we tell that story? So one of the things, one of the things that we used to do and our agents still do is we do virtual house hunting. So my agents will sometimes do 360 walkthroughs of properties because we're buying houses from across the country and sometimes we can't fly out and see them ourselves. So it becomes, you know, listing pictures are a specific angle.

They're going to sometimes be positioned to market the home. That's what they are. So this is the authentic, no filter view of these properties. And I saw some lady in San Diego who was on the news and it was like she sold a house via FaceTime, which is just like a very basic level of virtual house hunting. And my agents have been doing that for a long time. They had been doing these long distance showings using their phone and then we use 360 cameras. And so I built an entire software called Savvy House Hunting, which still exists today, which is an incredible portal where you can share, I don't own it anymore, but an incredible portal where you can share live 360 walkthroughs of properties. So you can

actually see what it's like to be in that home. Do you know how difficult it is to explain to someone something that's never existed before? So the reason why so many people are doing it is because there's a need for it. We're having that experience with our investing education platform because it's like it's very it's like the hybrid of a bunch of different things and i'm like yes you can invest on it but also we're not just dumping you in you get to like be guided about how to invest and people are like oh so it's an app and i can get it in the app store and i'm like no not yet not exactly like yeah you're like it's like duolingo meets like headspace but also meets like a live workshop yeah it's very difficult to describe everyone wants to be an innovator believe me when you go like consumer education you have to like describe to someone how this

is new and different it is very difficult so if just like even like an inventor, right? But when you're looking at some space, I do think it is difficult to create something out of nothing. It is easier to create something better of something that already exists. I didn't create, I wasn't the first person to create a military relocation network. I saw the gaps and the problems that the current networks created and had, And then we did it differently to fill those gaps. And of course we have now competitors coming around who are trying to fill the gaps that maybe they think we have, but there is more than enough people who need to be served. How many, there's like how many billions of people in this world? And the other thing is,

is that, sorry, this is where I ramble. And I even did a post about this. I was worried about rambling, but we're just going to keep going with it. You know, know people come on these platforms they want millions of views and millions of views and millions of views in reality like 100 clients would change your life we don't need a million views we don't and also the people who do get a million views have no idea what to do once they've gotten it which i will do in a whole upper episode but like our most viral video was a 7 million viewed video. And like, I think three or 4 million of that came in the first week from that one video in one week, we got a hundred thousand email subscribers, but because we knew what to do with virality, it wasn't just like, this is fun. It was like, okay, okay this is fun and we've set up a system to be able

to support it so i had one of my agents who i who were working on her business and she had a video go viral on tiktok like three weeks ago we just started working the other four weeks ago she had video go viral it must have been like two weeks ago hit 4.6 million views at 2 000 leads and is booked out till june And when she called me, she was like, what do I do? I was like, get your Lincoln bio.

And now the training's already up, get it in. Now you capture as much information possible. And by the way, if they're booked at June, they're not going to show up. We need to get them in, in the next 30 days or they're gone.

So we need to increase our service. Otherwise they're gone. It's great that we created the relationship, but like no one's going to want it now. Yeah. To get that information for June. So do we go to a webinar? Do we like a training panel but yeah the ability to know what to do how to capture and then grow from there and then turn those views into into paying clients and paying your mortgage and feeding your family which i

like to remind people that's the only thing we're here to do is like feed our families it's not about buying a lamborghini it's hard it's an art that'd be fun though yeah i'd rather rent one you're gonna buy a lamborghini tori that's your vibe no i'm gonna buy a mustang okay good go for it whatever makes you happy whatever brings you joy it's hard though because in seattle it's so impractical but i have now been in two different like warm locations in the past two years where i've rented a mustang and it was like my soul came into being. And I was like, all right, Kristen knows Kristen drove around with me in it. But like, I love it.

It's like an extension of my personality. And I'm like, I think this is what I need to do at some point. So I went through this. One of the things I love to do with our agents, I think you've found this right, is that you have to be able to make money at what you do for a living, but you also have to be able to have joy. Like what you just described there is absolute joy. And sometimes it's not a money-making activity, it's a joy-making activity, right? But when you put the two together, you find a deep amount of purpose and then you can show up every single day and it doesn't feel like you're working. But you and I are both very practical people. We will almost always choose to put in our Roth IRA versus

buying a Mustang. But when you are disciplined and you do something where you have purpose, where you show up every single day because it doesn't feel like a job, you get the luxury of investing in things that are just joyful. So you should not feel bad about it. I absolutely love it. If you don't do it, you're setting a bad example for your following. I'm going to challenge you. Okay. Cause it feels, yeah. And even to me is, it's like, it's a guilty purchase. It's ridiculous. It's completely impractical. Do we need to try to get your book out? Where's the chapter about where women feel bad about buying things? Oh, I'm well aware. I am my own, my own little thesis. No, but that's, that's, I mean, we can have a whole hour long discussion about this and we will wrap this up in a second, but

like you, you never feel like you're doing enough. And it's also as women, you are ashamed of no matter what you do. So you may as well just do whatever the fuck you want. That's very true. Yeah. Also, if you come from the intention of like truly wanting to serve people and help people grow, you, you will always give more than you get. I mean, there are millions of people that you've changed their life. You deserve it. Thank you. Right back at you.

So tell us about Pay It Forward. So PCS Pay It Forward, you can find us on Facebook. Go to the page, find your local community. I have incredible agents who are waiting their help. We call them ambassadors. They are all military spouses and veterans. They will go the extra mile for you to help you find your home. Whether you buy, sell, or rent, go into base housing, it does not matter.

We're here to help make things just a little bit easier. I love it. And where can people find you? You can find me at likelaurentaylor on both TikTok and Instagram. I love to connect if there's any way I can ever help you. I love the messages. So if there's anything I ever do to make your life a little bit easier, I do tons of training. So send me the topic. I'm sure I have an hour long training on it and I'll send it to you. I love it. Thanks for being here. You're so welcome. Thank you for having me. Thank you again to Lauren for joining us for this episode. If you have friends or family in the military, please share this episode and honestly, all of our episodes in our show with them. This show continues to go on because of your support and listens and shares. And a reminder, if you're interested in joining our Stock Market School,

our exclusive community that teaches you step-by-step how to invest, you can do so at the link in our show notes. Thanks again for joining us. Make sure to check out the show notes for more information on Lauren and all of our amazing guests. Thanks for being here, Financial Feminists. We appreciate it and we'll catch you later. guests. Thanks for being here, Financial Feminists. We appreciate it, and we'll catch you later. Thank you for listening to Financial Feminist, a Her First 100K podcast. Financial Feminist is hosted by me, Tori Dunlap, produced by Kristen Fields, marketing and administration by Karina Patel, Sharice Wade, Alina Helzer, Paulina Isaac, Sophia Cohen, Khalil Demaz, Elizabeth McCumber, Beth Bowen, and Amanda LeFue. Research by Arielle Johnson, audio engineering by Austin Fields, A huge thanks to the entire Her First 100K team and community for supporting the show.

For more information about Financial Feminist, Her First 100K, our guests, and episode show notes, visit financialfeministpodcast.com or follow us on Instagram at financialfeministpodcast.