can anyone be an investor isn't investing just for rich people it seems so inaccessible how do I get started there's so much to consider when starting to invest and clarity about your goals is a must when you know what you want your future to look like you can reshape your present you probably weren't taught about how to manage your finances growing up I know I wasn't and most of us can feel confused or overwhelmed with the sheer volume of options that's why I'm running a free investing Workshop today on December 12th as well as tomorrow on December 13th which will give you the tools to take control and start your investing Journey with confidence you can secure your free spot at erica.com sgrow we'll also be doing a live Q&A session as well remember the best time to start investing was 10 years ago but the second best time to start is now head to erica.com gr W and book your free spot for my investing work workshop I'll also leave the link in the description and I'm excited to see you there before I was 19 I'm $35,000 a debt when did you have your aha moments I remember one time seeing my mom cry after a Bill Clinton called her just really hit me there like hey the caliber of my future will be determined by the choices that I make and I have to make better choices and own the choices that I did Anthony O'Neal is a best-selling author course creator host speaker and educator he is passionate about helping people build wealth and find their purpose in life hey your life is in your hands and you got to take control of your life you got to invest into yourself you know you got to start learning I want to show the world that you can be successful financially I'm Erica Colberg and you're listening to the Erica taught me podcast what was your earliest money memory o e man I would had to be maybe 10 years old and my Dad pulled up a chair not a stepping stool a little chair that we sit on and said hey you got to wash these dishes and if you wash these dishes I'm going to give you $ Dollar that's my first money memory is the first dollar I ever remember having was with me spending an hour and a half washing dishes and I thought I was just Rich because I had a dollar but it was a good learning experience because that that was my way that was my dad's way of saying hey in exchange for money you got to work you got to do something so you just can't get a hand out cuz I used to ask my dad for candy and for ice cream and all that kind of stuff and he said hey cool great you want some money pulled up a chair I stood up on it he ran the water he ran the soap Su I wash the dishes and he gave me $1 and now that I'm older my dad you robbed me man $1 I already half of my time come on dad that was even minimum wage but that was my first money memory though and I love it though were your parents good with money you know if I say that you get me in trouble e uh because know my mom and dad they love your show so I would definitely say at that time they were not as good as as what they should have been they're much better now but back then no we I would definitely say respectfully we we were living paycheck to paycheck at that time but my father and mother always tried to make sure that they weren't doing the right thing they want to make sure they set us up to do the right thing and I respect that when did you first start making big decisions about money and what do you think was the biggest money mistake that you made you know big decisions with money well the biggest mistake that I ever made was that I think that started my downward path of getting money was uh taking out student loans when I didn't need to take out any student you know so my father uh went it was in the Army and he had the GI Bill and so I went off to school and GI Bill took care of everything but I see all my friends getting their refund checks and buying you know rims for their cars and taking out ladies to eat and going on Spring Breaks I was like well shoot like where's my refund check and my counselor told me you don't need it because your dad pick the GI bill but if you needed to live I mean you can apply for it and you can get like 10 grand I was like 10 $10,000 I'm 18 this is 2002 I'm like T do you know I can do with t let me get that and so I I did it and um man I I never forget none of that went toward school it went towards I bought um spinner Wheels I'm gon say this is going to show how old I am I bought wheels that just kept spinning when you stopped oh those are cool I know them you know what I'm saying you know so I bought those but I put that it was $5,000 on the car that the transmission was blown in it couldn't even go in reverse so the car could only go forward but then we stopped the car the wheels kept spinning and I think that was the worst money decision I've ever made in my life because I didn't need that and so when I was exposed to you can borrow money and have all this cash on you I went out and borrowed more money I went out and took out more credit cards and I was like yo before I was 19 I'm $35,000 in debt and that's that doesn't seem like a lot today but in 2002 at 18 and a half that was a lot of money and so I I really learned a lot from that because I started getting Bill cuts it started calling my parents looking for me because I wasn't paying it cu no one taught me like hey if you borrow money you got to pay it back no one taught me about what his interest on a credit card and so I'm thinking this is all free money and I can just pay back whenever when now when those bills started coming I didn't have the the financial resources to pay them when did you have your aha moment that oh my goodness I have to pay these back I think the aha moment hit me when I had to drop out of school for making a bad decision and my mom and dad just pretty much lined out all the bills cuz all the bills was coming to their house and uh I was like hey you right now your monthly payments are right around $4,000 Eric I wasn't even making at that time maybe $ 800 a month and and because I got kicked out of school I had to drop out of school I made a bad decision in school and my parents was like okay we don't we don't condone that so since you think you're a grown man go find your own place to stay I was homeless at the age of 19 I got $4,000 a month due on on bills I'm sleeping in the back of my car my family and my friends are thinking I'm I'm staying with one of my girlfriends and I was actually sleeping in the Walmart parking lot and life just really hit me there like hey the caliber of my future will be determined by the choice that I make and I have to make better choices and own the choices that I did and that's when life really hit me and said okay the first choice you got to make is you got to learn how to be a better man make wiser decisions then number two hey if you borrow money you got to pay it back and that's when I really started realizing that I don't really want to borrow money anymore I want to live free and half Freedom and so I started really just doing research and studying people and and I started studying Robert ke saki uh Dave Ramsey who I eventually connected with and became good friends and worked with them for a season and other people in the financial space and out of all those people the Dave Ramsey method just really stuck with me and I just started rocking that method of of having a debt-free lifestyle how does it feel though in that moment when you're sleeping in your car how can you feel hope that you'll get out of that situation you know I think for me it was you know some people may not agree with this statement but I think I needed my parents knew that if they allowed me to come home after making that bad decision um after racking up that much debt that home was honestly going to keep me in that lifestyle and so for me to go homeless The Hope was it matured me faster it grew me faster it it made me to look at myself in the mirror and say you know what I was blaming my parents for not teaching me I was blaming my friends for using me to get all the money and I was blaming everyone else but I never pointed the finger at me and so so during that situation The Hope was hey your life is in your hands and you got to take control of your life and man and when I did that I said okay and has has life been easy since then no have I made all the right decisions with my money no because I've made a lot more money since then but I have not I don't borrow any more money and I am living way below my means and it just feels good to have that so the Hope Came From really myself my faults owning my decisions and accepting that hey if you want a better future then you got to make better decisions so you've realized that okay I need to pay back this debt what's then the next step practically to start getting you there are you working on earning more money or did you set up a budget what do you remember what you did yeah the very first thing when I went home I apologized to my parents and told them I was like hey you know I'm not I'm not a grown man yet I'm only 18 19 you know what I'm saying that's not grown I'm still a little kid and my parents was like thank you thank you for saying that cuz you're not grown you still need us and when you need us you ain't grown you know so I was like all right you're right okay don't throw it in my face and then the second thing man my dad gave me a a budget form a Dave Ramsey budget form and he said hey you're going to you need to learn how to budget I said well budget what he said yeah that's the third thing you need a job you need you need an income and so my parents gave me a year to live in their house and they said hey you can have a year you don't this year you don't have any friends dating who is she what what huh it it was you got to get money you need to get out of debt so you can get on your own two feet as a young man and so that was a very first step was really learning how to budget bring in the income and I went and work three jobs my very first job was a bill collector in Erica that that was scary it was scary for me to be a bill collector because when I got on the job I didn't know that they were collecting a particular credit collecting for a particular credit card that I owed and so while I'm sitting there calling other people and you know back then you don't know who you're about to call you don't get a list of names the computer just brings up a name and you call it for the first three months of me on that job Erica I'm sweating thinking my name better not come up call yourself and call myself or nobody from this office better call me I'm sitting here sweating so instantly my first two paychecks I paid off that card because I was like yo I I I can get a TR they can fire me and so I did the morning shift so I did the 5:00 a.m. cuz I was on the west coast in California San Diego and so we will call the East Coast at 8:00 a.m. so from 5: to 3:00 p.m. I worked and then from about 3: to about 600 7:00 I wash cars and then at about like 2 o'clock in the morning I go deliver newspapers and so I was working three jobs to one get out of debt two to have some savings and three to eventually move out of my house and so I think the very first step for me was really getting a plan for your money and then also having income coming in because one thing that I've learned on both of our platforms we're helping people get out of debt and really get control their money right but we can only teach that so much if they don't have income coming in that doesn't matter so the first step for me is having income and having a plan for that income on the debt collection oh now that you've been on the other side too what are some tips for negotiating down your debt oh that's so good right there e you know boy I used to get them boy I used to well I was I was let me tell you right now I was a number one debt collector cuz I just I just knew how to scare people and I hate to say that that's so bad you sound proud of that I know I know but it's back then but now when you ask me that question no one's never asked me this question Erica you're a great interview this is really good here's number one if you're on the other side of it don't be scared when they call you they're going to say anything and everything to try and get their money the best time to pay your collections is the last three days of the month on the last three days of the month everybody you can get your your debt paid down to about 30 30 cents on the dollar right so let's say for an example you owe $100 be an example example you can honestly pay them at $30 and settle in the full well if we wait for the last 3 days they're going to update the credit report and I'm not really a huge fan of the credit report but here here's something you should know if you wait for like the last three days and you really hold your gun say you know what I owe you a 100 but I'm going to give you $40 and you have to give me a pay in full letter you got a report is paid in full there are some collection agencies that would do that so that they can get the money because understand everyone on the opposite side of that phone they're all commission based and they if you owed $1 they didn't pay $100 for that debt they probably paid $10 for the debt and they're trying to make some profit on it right and so the lowest at that time we could go with 25 cents on the dollar without approval I don't have to ask my manager and then too let me tell you this too when they say hey let me get my manager on the phone Erica it's just me and you we co-workers we put you on pause Eric Erica come talk to him pretend you're my manager yeah pretend you're my manager just just run and play this you know what I'm saying I'm trying to get 30 cents in the doar all right cool Mr Anil this is Erica how are you and uh yeah yeah yeah I'm the site manager here and uh you know this is what I can do if you if you can write a check today write a check today I can approve 25 cent oh my God thank you so much than I can do 25% and when they put you back on pause and they all screaming and no manager never came to the ph and so I think for me it's just really about if you are on the opposite side um never do a check because i' I've seen it several times where they'll run your account let's say if you settled in full for $30 they're running for $30 this month and they're running for $30 the next month so never do a check and my thing is over the phone too is don't do a credit card send in a certified money check with a certified letter so that way you get it and then never pay them until you get it in writing on letterhead saying hey we're going to settle it in full um and those are steps that I do and then and I always try to negotiate for paying full letters um and have them remove it from your credit report not all collection agencies would do it but the majority of them within the last three business days of the month oh man they're going through uh all kinds of stuff to get the money in because they have to report it back to you know the bosses say Hey listen we we collected and we made money it was a great job for me because I was able to make at that time about $2 $3,000 a month wow you know back commission based and you're good I was real good I was so good at that thing Erica that they actually moved me to Jacksonville Florida to open up help open up one of the collection agencies I went to be a true site manager to where I had other collectors up underneath me and I would train them and help them uh collect money but you had people back then making five six $7,000 a month in 2002 now in today's day and time that may not be a whole lot of money but to the average American making $5,000 now that's real good money one of the biggest challenges as a Creator is making enough to earn a living doing what you love and you don't want to miss out on opportunities and leave valuable money on the table today's sponsor kajabi makes it easy to diversify your Revenue build your own brand and turn your audience into customers they provide a onstop shop to turn your skills passion and experiences into enriching online courses exclusive membership sites thriving communities personalized coaching subscription podcasts and so much more kajabi is the ultimate all-in-one platform that helps creators and entrepreneurs build successful online businesses by unlocking predictive recurring Revenue you don't need a huge audience to make sustainable income there are thousands of creators on kajabi making six and seven figures with less than 50,000 followers Right Now kajabi is offering a 30-day free trial to start your own business if you go to kajabi.com that's K Aja a.com Erica with a K go to kajabi.com to earn more doing what you love I'll put the the link in the description talk me through the script that I can use because for example you said that at your place you guys paid 25% so or you were happy collecting 25% yes meaning if you owed $1,000 if you collected $250 you're happy how do I find that magic number of what I can get them down to in this negotiation start real low just so like for an example if someone calls you and says hey you know uh Erica I'm calling from such and such you owe this particular debt is $11,000 okay cool tell them the truth right now hey I don't have $1,000 if I did I would have paid them but I'm in a good position now to where I could do something but I really don't want to prolong this situation so ask them hey what is your best offer and I'm not trying to play any games like can I just give you 150 bucks when me call it a rrap nine times out of 10 they're going to say no right uh then nine times out of 10 they're going to come back with hey we could do it at 600 we'll say be 400 then you come back and say hey I'll give you 250 go to that 25 cents number and stay there and be to hang up they're going to call you back the next day they're going to make threats they're going to say hey we're going to call your job hey we're going to call your neighbors cuz that's called skip tracing they they could do that kind of stuff right but it's like now it's those last three days they're going to come to their very bottom number now what I will tell you is if you don't take advantage of it during those last three days you're not going to get that offer again and then what's going to happen is they're going to go back up or they may sell it again they may sell the debt to another collection agency and so because they're like oh it's hopeless exactly and keep in mind you know when it comes to the credit reporting right it's a lot of people think well I haven't paid this thing in seven years it's going to fall off no no no no that's not the case so if if I sell Erica's debt today that restarts to seven years because it's brand new and so just take advantage if you have the the financial resources just tell them the truth hey I I'll give you 30 cents on the dollar that's the best I can do right now I need to pay in for set full letter on letter here you can email it to me and I'll certify the fund to you today overnight typically like I got really into learning about medical debt because a lot of my audience I found out had medical debt and typically you actually don't want it to go to collections because it's harder to negotiate once it gets to collections is it on medical on medical wow but is that what it's like for when you credit cedit n when I was doing it back in 2002 nah it it I never collected on medical so I don't know anything about medical I only collected on credit cards and credit cards the thing that I do not like about the collection agency is just that they're very disrespectful um and they will say whatever and do whatever to collect those funds and it wasn't something I was proud of doing I know I never disrespected anyone but I knew how to talk yeah and I knew how to scare you a little bit before Crossing that line because I remember one time seeing my mom cry after a bill collector called her and I said you know what I need this job but I don't want to get to that point to where I have somebody's mother's grme and so it it's really not hard if you just know how to negotiate and just stand true you know and but with us yeah we always settled I promise you 90% of the time we never collected 100% of what the Deb was but are they collecting that on the medical are they getting 100% on the medical side of things are you seeing that when it goes to collection yeah when it collection it's also a fraction of it very fraction I want to say 30% wow I'm telling you right now there's some I have some some guys in the collection agency now they're paying 5 cents 10 cents on a dollar for whatever that debt is so they're not paying a lot of money and I think that's something for people to understand now for me my my bills though I actually did a little different you know so I honestly didn't settle I actually paid him in full it was it was a spiritual conviction for me uh because I really wanted to well no no no no let me let me retract that I did settle on one uh but two of them on my spiritual journey I felt bad not paying back and full that's just for me you know because I I paid one to settle then when I settle I was like dang they gave me 100% And I gave them back that man and I remember talking to my family I was like yeah bro CU how would you feel if someone did you that way so that was a spiritual thing for me though I'm not recommending that for everybody I'm just saying that was for me no I think I think the Practical advice you're giving is so good to learn how to negotiate you got to Lear learn how to negotiate on everything I negotiate everything even though I got the money I can afford it I'm like just because I can afford it as mean no wait a minute like how how much is that again $100 what about 60 like I negotiate if I can I'm going to negotiate listen I negotiate dates Erica what do you mean that I'm serious like I what First Dates I ain't spend no more than $99.99 oh that's fair yeah exactly you know what I'm saying cuz I mean these ladies out here talking about yeah well we need to go to rot Chris I need I need at least $200 well no I mean List we can do we can do 100 you want to do 100 you should do coffee dates then you can minimize it to ER I don't know about $15 you know my sister's I haven't been in the dating World in a long time you can tell Erica would that not work it just won't work are you married you married yeah yeah yeah so yeah Erica I mean I mean listeners please let her know in the comments chat somewhere let her know coffee dates in today's day time just ain't working I agree with you I would love to be I would love to go to the coffee house I seriously would but saying this respectfully in the in my community the the the African-American Community nah my sisters ain't going for no coffee day they like boy you wouldn't me put on some red bottoms and get all dressed up and get my hair dead and do all the type of stuff and you taking me to a $10 coffee date like is is that all that I'm worth and it's like the first date doesn't doesn't doesn't mean nothing about how much you're worth it's I'm just trying to get to know you but these like n I'm not about to get doled up to get just only spend $10 yeah it doesn't work do you split the check no I've never split now I'm a man now I'm I'm a grown man now my my mom and dad will be upset if I ever split it a check I think it's fine to split it you think so yeah I mean but you I mean you're very successful how long have you been married seven years see or no wait why did I say seven together seven married four married four so from my platform I I don't see there's nothing wrong with it but I'm not teaching men to split the first day okay leave by an example well I thought I could save you 50% I like to negotiating you I like that no I mean but I think it's I think it's definitely fair but I just think back to your original question I think you got to really sit back and negotiate everything you know I've had the opportunity to be around a lot of wealthy individuals wealthier than me and mean they they negotiate yeah you know they they said how much is and I think that's why they're wealthier because just because they have the money just because I have the money doesn't mean we need to spend all of it I'm redoing my basement right now in my house and removing my studio from my basement to actual Studio building in DC and so I had a couple people negotiating and uh but I spent the whole month just negotiating prices like hey hey hey John I had three people John Bill and Reay for an example John Bill said x amount okay okay okay all right Ray Bill and John said x amount so it that negotiating ended up saving me close to about $6,000 wow when one of them had worked on my house from the very beginning and by the time I got back to him he's who I really wanted but I wanted him to know like yo bro just because you pull up and you see what I have doesn't mean you're going to charge this price and so I negotiate period And I save money y bro I know you got it I don't have it I can't afford that doesn't mean I'm broke it just means I can't afford to pay that price and so we're going to negotiate and get the best price cuz I want to be a good good Steward with my finances as well no I think that's fair yeah I negotiate everything it's a bit embarrassing sometimes because now people recognize me and they're like yeah you would negotiate like that is part of your character I mean isn't that I mean think about it if I'm trying to sell you something I already know off the top oh Eric about to negotiate with me Bo see I already know it you know and when people see me and it's so funny it's so funny you say that because when I go out and dates or when people come around me oh that's the money guy you know he don't e put that credit card away I went out on one date and we were dating for a while she was about to pay for it I saw her go for her credit card and she literally and put her debit card out so when people deal with me it is funny yeah they just know like well this is Anthony O'Neal let's not have this conversation or hey Anthony is not GNA spend this kind of money on this and the truth is I may but we're going to negotiate we gonna have a conversation about this price wait so that's right you don't believe in credit cards you don't have any credit C cards no just your debit card just my debit card you realize how crazy that is hey man I mean I understand that I think for me and here's here's my truth right and I can say this now I don't believe that credit cards are just it's not a bad thing I think for me I want to show the world that you can be successful financially and not borrow any money now mind you I have real estate and I borrow money for my real estate right but to go buy this iPhone I'm just gonna pay cash for it you know to go buy my cards that I have I Sav up and pay cash for it and it's not because I feel as if that having a credit card is just the dumbest thing in the world I don't believe that I believe that for the majority of the people in America they cannot have a credit card but Erica could a a someone else one of my mentors very very well known he does but I just want to be an example that hey borrowing money this you you don't have to now of course when it comes to real estate you know My Philosophy is like hey borrow what you can to go to go get into real estate build those investment portfolios up but why are we borrowing money to go to go buy a pair of Louis Vuittons or why that's fair if you're if you're borrowing on a credit card and don't pay it back in time and have to pay interest I agree yeah that is frivolous and unnecessary but generally you know me I love credit cards I get my benefits I get my points I get the warranty extension I get baggage insurance everything that comes with these credit cards I love it I love it no I'm serious from a personal tip man I just don't I actually like the freedom of of waking up and knowing that I don't have any debt out there other than my mortgage um and it just feels so good uh I remember when I went in to purchase my my dream card and it was like yo we need to pull credit I was like no I mean why why are we pulling credit you better pay cash for this I said yeah they said that is the dumbest thing you could do I said really I said it is dumb dumb for me to pay cash for my car that I plan on keeping for like 10 15 years because the kind of car that I I purchased the body style don't change for at least 10 to 12 years what's the car sa Bentley oh yeah I saved up for that thing about four years AG you're so fancy hey man listen I saved I saved for four years I drove you can pull up in the Bentley and then take them to $10 coffee because then they know you have the money but see that's what I'm trying to do but that's the problem I pull up in the Bentley and they're like why are we going to Starbucks you know so I'm like oh my gosh but I mean you know I saved I mean I saved like close to like 30 40 Grand a year and drove a ACL um until like the wheels almost came off I had like 213,000 mies I think right around 200 something thousand miles in that car before I sold it from there I bought a Porsche I bought a old Porsche like 2014 or 13 drove that put 100,000 miles on it and just saved because I knew where I wanted to go and I just wanted to be an example to people that hey you can do this financing it or you could do it paying cash and I don't think there's a lot of people on the cash side showing good examples everyone that we see on the pay cash side is it's it's the Be Frugal and and and drive the Honda with the ugly cars and living his home and I'm like yeah no that's not me I like nice things but I I don't want to have to be in debt for it neither though so if that means I had to save for 4 years and pay and I bargained see I negotiated I walked up in that J I said no man they had this price I said no I walked off I said listen man if y'all want this it's cool I went in right around the 13th of the month I remember the middle of the month then they called me the car was still sitting there I was like bro I'm not coming in like if you you're not gonna come in and sell me bro you should know this by now like I know AO I know AO I said send me the invoice I'll get the certified check and I'll come up there you're not selling me no extended warranty you're not selling me to fix the wheel package you ain't selling me none I'm bringing in a check I'm ass sign the paperwork and here go your check and they literally gave it to me for what I asked for Wow but I was also willing to wait I was willing to walk away from it and I was also willing to do research and the the the good thing about it was it was in my city so I didn't have to travel um and here's the thing I was negotiating I some Hime they got one in Florida it's about five grand over my asking but I'm pretty sure if I call them right now they'll do it so the sales R came back to me about like four days later and said hey man if you come in and get it we we'll sell it to you I said cool great came in there and it feels good to drive that car and I had the pink slip in my safe you know like I I just love to know that I own it it feels good but I have a lot of friends who are doing exactly what you do right you know they have a credit card they're financing things well they don't really Finance cars they're like me but they financing cars is a no no for me is it for real yeah I I didn't know that e for real no yeah you should not I got bring you on my show this would be a you should not be financing cars you shouldn't what's your philosophy on it do you think this is your show and I'm asking you a question make sure I get this clip to put on my channel okay here's a question e why do you think financing cards is no no for you then I think if you have to finance a car you're buying a car that's out of your budget can y'all put the camera on me come on E let's go no okay so one of the things that you said was so good was once you agreed on the price for the car you said that's it don't add anything on because there's this psychological thing that happens when you buy a car and you negotiate it down okay you get it down $33,000 and you're so proud of yourself you're on that high so then when they take you to the back to the sign the paperwork when they start saying okay well would you like to add heated seats would you like to add the insurance would you like to add this benefit you add all these things up and now all the savings that you got initially are counteracted by these things that you've added on but have like they've because you felt like you had that psychological win they your guard is down by the time they get you back there to sign hey you know so after I did collections you know what I did next what so cars really what wasn't that your Technique what we will happily T down the price on on the front end because we knew on the back end we'll get you on a warranty we maybe spent $2,000 for the warranty but then charge you 5,000 so if if you T this down on the front end 3,000 well we made it up on the back end with a 3,000 profit yeah and what a lot of people don't know and I hate to say this CU I got some people in the car space I'm so sorry but those financial people who are signing paperwork they get a huge commission off of the warranties and the policy they sell you for those cars so it was like you really have to go in there with your number and stick with that number period because everything is marked up tremendously in a car business and then now and I want to say this correctly because both of our platforms I want to misquote um it's they can even go up or percentage on the percentage of the interest and they get a fee of that so I was like this is interesting this like wow so they'll come down on the price of the car but they may get you on the interest rate because if they go up on the interest rate they'll get a portion of that if they charge you for insurance and for your whe insurance I'm like that is the y'all it will insurance for my car they wanted like what was it like six grand for whe insurance I was like bro no I just add two grand to the savings we good yeah that was a good one I just you have to stick to your number and you have to be willing to walk away yeah because sales reps are taught very well on how to sell and and what they try to do is they hey man how's your wife how's family they want to get you comfortable then when you get comfortable so yeah so this is what we can do you know listen man you just had a new born the last thing you want to do is hit a hit a hit a curb and Dent your wheel and now you got to spend another three grand you just had a newborn just go ahead and just spend two grand to get this coverage and we'll cover you so they got you comfortable y I be looking at them like man don't try me bro you've been on the other side too I've been on the other side and it's just me I just done the research and I know this is my number and this is why I'm very big on emergency funds because things will happen with our cars right especially if you're buying used like what I teach something is bound to happen if if you're married your kid May scratch a car you may get a dent on a car this is why I encourage 3 to six months of expenses but then also if you do have a little bit more of expensive car like a BMW Mercedes add just a little something on top for that you know so that way you're being wise and you don't have to dive into your three to six months of expenses but you also have a car fund just in case something not just in case if it's just a matter of when something's going to happen I did actually hit a curb in my car and I had to get the wheel replac and what I found out was I didn't have to replace the whole wheel I just had to get someone come out and just fix the wheel and that was only 400 bucks like wow so do your research stick to your number stick to the plan you'll be straight the stick to the number is so good because this is another one that you can confirm but car salesman use is they get you to psychologically Envision owning the car already so they'll say okay come in the car like let's do this test drive feel the breeze and they want you to Envision owning it so that your price goes up but the whole thing is you have to have that price your max that you're willing to pay before they get take you through this experience oh it's so good that's good e because here here's what I'm gonna do if I'm a salesperson let's say if you come in and you want to drive you say you know what I'm looking for a Honda well they're going to go put you in a Mercedes and they want you to fill the Mercedes because it cost more they can sell you more on the Mercedes and so now they know like you said own how does it feel feel you own this oh my gosh yeah how much more is is going to cost in a Honda well you know we can run the numbers we we can make it work for you but look at that leather you feel how that leather is gripping you the Honda got cloth in it and so you're right it's like you got to S to your number and you go there if you know you want that car and that car is in your budget go only drive that car within your budget because they're going to try and upsell you with a better car a car that has more margin in it right so do your research man just just do your research that's the key thing I think people go into anything when it comes to money they go into it blind they don't research when it comes to purchasing a car making an investment investing into stocks uh buying a home they're not researching on okay wait is this a good number is this the best investment for me to make is this a good car what's the quality of this car this is a good dealership are they known for ripping people off and so the key thing that I tell everyone is before you purchase anything over $500 do the research just study and just see what's going on everyone's talking about the new iPhone right now and I'm like well if you got the iPhone 14 why are you buying a new iPhone 15 it's the same phone just with a new charger why are you going to go spend $1,000 and then I think they said like nearly 6% of the people are actually financing the phone so why are you financing this phone when it's the same phone as a previous one just with a newer charger and it can charge a little bit faster and it it's the same charger work for your computer now that Mak makes no sense keep your money yeah do the research of all these things what do you think is the number one thing that car salesman do to trick you into buying more I tell you bet they gonna be upset with me but we can get your payments as low as $399 a month but your interest rate is at 20% and your car is going to cost you about $50,000 just an example the number one trick that I think they get people is the payment is the monthly payment because the average person only cares about what they're spending out monthly when the wealthy individuals we care about what am I spending period for the car and so you need to negotiate the price of the car up front and if you're going to finance which me and Erica totally disagree with that you know what I'm saying then then you can negotiate from there but for me it's it's the what's the price of the car but that's how salesman get you it's hey we got you at your payment $500 a month what's your interest rate how long is it is this $500 a month for seven years eight I mean we have some car loans now going out to 10 years with a 15 16% interest rate but it's oh I can afford the $500 yeah but then three years from now you are screwed the moment you drive off the lot you're screwed but the more and more and more and the miles you put on that car you will always be in this this trap of now you got this car on top of that car on top of this car so that's the number one thing that I think they get people with is that right there the monthly pay so good that's so good because that's one of the first things they asked too is like okay how much do you want to pay per month and they can stretch that loan as long as they want to make sure that you get that monthly payment exactly but that's why you have to ask what is the total cost of ownership and factoring the interest otherwise they're going to trick you and then and and honestly you guys I I'll tell people this if you are going to do the monthly payment rout which I don't I I I don't do that don't start off at your your max number because they know well they said 500 so they can really do 600 go in there like hey don't mention a number if you're going to find it I I can afford $220,000 for a car what's a car and that's $20,000 after tax tags and title so if it's 20,000 plus tax tags and I can't afford that car I need $20,000 all in out the door love this and they Tred to get me on my card like oh yeah we can get you that number plus tax tags and title I was like I'm sorry I can't afford that I literally got my check I like I'm sorry no we no no no we we agreed this was a number bro but that is the number for the car no no no no no no no no that's the number for the car but y'all want more no no sir I'm good he's a man we'll figure it out they don't like me because I they didn't make as much yeah I appreciate that but they didn't make as much money on it because here's here's the thing too you guys back in what 2000s paying cash was actually a very good thing because for financing cars they had to wait almost 30 days to get the check from the bank so if you're coming in a cash buyer or you getting the best deal because they had margin well now it's since the power of internet now social media the C is is hard to negotiate so now they make money off of you financing so when you walk in with a cash deal you're actually hurting the dealership because they're not making as much money as they would want if you pay cash and you don't buy any other products from them and then they lose out in the financing part so I I go in there I just smile say say you know y'all going to make y i me I want you to make some money you're just not going to make as much I'm sorry I love it you know I stick to the guns man that's what I do I love that we've gone through your career of the debt collector and then the car salesman what did you do next oh man I think from there I went into just um Ministry fulltime and then from Ministry I had the opportunity to work with Dave Rams and his amazing team and crew over there for about six and a half years and and then now I am out on my own teaching the same message of really just having uh the debt-free lifestyle um and Building Wealth I mean really owning your table you know the title of my show is called the table and it really stands for how do you take a seat and on the table that you sit at and I'm really gearing it and focusing really on minority group of people and really taking the education that I've I've learned from working with Dave from being out there in the world and all my mistakes and taking it back to uh the minority communities and cultures and schools so I can teach them the truth about debt because I really wish somebody taught me this the basics of how to finance how to not Finance how to budget how to uh finance a home properly you know how to make good Investments what is a what is a Roth IRA I was just in a barber shop the other day and my barber didn't even know what a IRA was and I was like okay yeah I got a lot of work to do because the basics a lot of people want to make a lot of money and make it quick but they don't know what to do with the money when they get it and we make bad decisions so now I'm in the space of like just really taking this message uh to the minority group of people and and individuals and I'm having a blast doing it because just seeing someone's face you know seeing a single mother of two kids um understanding what it understanding and learning what's a custodial Roth IRA you know um learning how to set her kids up to be better than her and than what she is at now just puts joy in my heart to really teach the basic of financial literacy um and I turn a lot of them on to YouTube I'm like yo she be dropping some facts y'all she be teaching some things on how to get them watch it watch it and so uh I just I love doing that I really do I love it let's let's do the investing then because I feel like investing is the thing that it's not intuitive right budgeting people are like okay I think I get it but investing there's this level of intimidation too where people are like well I didn't see my parents investing I don't know anyone around me who invests so how the heck do I do it so where do you think people should start I mean here this is not going to be a most popular one cuz it Doesn't produce a lot money but it will produce a lot of money is you got to invest into yourself you know you got to start learning you know what podcast are you listening to are you listening to Erica are you listening to myself are you listening to Dave Ramsey are you listening to people like Ern leer stuff like that or who are you in listening to invest into your mind to grow your understanding that's key and so when I started doing that I started learning things like wait a minute HSA health savings account what is that and okay wait the HSA is attached to a highed doubtable health insurance plan well what's a high totable health health insurance plan I'm like well wait how did the health insurance plan on my payroll is only like $100 out of my check but I was doing po because when I was doing po my mom said that's the be best health insurance to get I'm like is it for me at my age and so when I started learning these things I went down to a a high deductible plan which simply means that I pay like $8,000 the first $88,000 which is attached to a HSA that HSA I can use that for all medical expenses or I can invest that money and so is I really learning these kind of things so for me investing I always start number one with a 401k if you have a job that's going to be a Roth or a traditional from there I go to an IRA uh which is going to be a Roth IRA or traditional IRA then from there I maxed out my hsas and those are the three main things that I really teach to start off with because the 401K you're going to get your company match the IRA is just like a 401k for the most part but but you're just not getting a match and then the HSA you can use that tax deferred money to pay for medical expenses and if you have a whole lot in there you can invest part of it to where that can grow and then eventually use that for medical expenses down the road because we all know I think what's the study is showing that we're going to need about $300,000 just for medical expenses when we get older so if we're investing into an Avenue tax-free to where we can use that money why not take advantage of it so those are the three first places that I teach people uh to really invest into when it comes to that and it's very important 401K needs to be at least the company match right so if it's 3% 5% you need to at least do that the goal overall for me is I'm looking at my gross number and I'm investing at least 10 to 15% of that that's what I'm doing period and then outside of investing those three things I always tell people the next one is real estate get into real estate and start a business those are the five main Investments that I teach within my community like do the three things that you know guarantee long-term or bring compound interest uh invest into yourself as far as in the business something that you own something that can produce Revenue instantly for you now and then real estate you know um and there's a secret in real estate that I tell people it's not really a secret but it's more so of like instead of for just looking at property look at land because we can't make no more land so go buy some land and sit on that put it in the trust put it somewhere so you can just sit on it for a while and then of course get you some some uh real estate after that but those are the five main things that I do I like that let's dig into the HSA a bit more because I don't think we've had a guest talk about the HSA cool can you just explain very Basics if someone has never heard of an HSA what we're supposed to do yeah yeah yeah so a health savings account is very basic on a very basic stage right is go to your job if you have a job right go to them ask them do you have a high deductible plan because a health savings account is only attached to a high deductible plan a high deductible plan simply means that before your health insurance kicks in you're going to have to pay whatever that that deductible is so for me in my company my high deductible is 8,000 let's say if I go to the hospital today and it cost me $1,000 well I'm going to report it to my health insurance but I got to pay the $1,000 but the moment it gets to $8,000 And1 my health insurance will kick in so a HSA is always attached to a high deductible plan so a HSA also allows you with that job since you do have a high deductible you can put money into the HSA account via your job so before your check comes they'll they'll take out $100 for an example put it inside of the HSA this is going to be before taxes are taken out right so now that's tax deferred money there's taxfree money in here that you can use and you can take that money let's say for the HSA let's say you do get sick let's say you need to go to the doctor you can take that $100 and spend it on your doctor visit you didn't pay taxes on $100 but for a lot of people because I always recommend this for like young healthier people man they'll have 5,000 $6,000 $10,000 in an account and they may use a th000 of that for their medical but they're going invest the other $99,000 so you can have your HSA company invest that $99,000 for you and now you're getting that compound interest the trick is though eventually the goal for that account is to use that money for medical expenses if you don't use it for medical expenses you will have to pay taxes and and and penalties if you pull it out earlier but if you wait till the time to pull it out then you only just pay the taxes at that time but for me my goal is to never use it for anything outside of medical because when I get older I'm going to need to I'm G to need some medical money and so why not use that tax-free money on my medical expenses and that's why they call it what is Triple tax savings ises that what they say yes yeah because you're saving it like you're saving it on a front end you're saving it when you're spending it and you're saving it upfront when you get older as long as you use it for medical expenses that's the key thing okay so the first three steps are the 401K yes then Ira yes then HSA what we just talked about right when people then say okay well what do I invest in what do you say I think that's where you got to do the research I don't really teach people what to invest in I always say sit down with a financial advisor and go and figure out one how aggressively do you want to invest and then look at the type of companies that you're going to invest in so for me I do mutual funds right and I sit down with the uh with my financial advisor even though I'm a money guy you're you're a money lady I have a financial advisor that tells me hey here's what's working here's what's not working we tend to blend some things and because of I I'm young and I like to see my money grow I may invest I I'm a very aggressive investor but I tell everyone I try not to teach hey invest into this invest into that because there's two things well there really three things when it comes to investing what to invest into number one you need to get with a financial advisor that would teach you and Coach you on what you're doing and what's going on in the economy so you understand that then number two you got to believe in what you're investing in you know and so a SE a safe bet I always tell people's a mutual fund right so that way you invest into multiple companies at once like the top 500 S&P 500 is a good example of that you going invest into the top 500 companies so if Apple dies well you still got Microsoft and these other companies that cover which is a great investment route I'm not a huge fan of single stocks you know but I know people who's won in single stocks but the numers show that the majority of people do not win when they invest solely into one single stock right and so I always tell people get with a financial advisor talk about what you're really interested in learn what's out there I always say bare minimum have a mutual fund open so that way you can invest into that figure out if you want to go aggressive or not as aggressive see if you want to invest into stocks or bonds or certificates me really have that conversation with your financial advisor but when it comes to the 401K I tell everyone up top if you have an option between Roth or traditional you go Roth yeah you know so go ahead and pay your taxes now let it grow roow taxfree that's all your money at 59 half or 65 whatever age that is I forgot up top of my head and then if you don't have Roth then you go traditional get the free money but uh I'm telling you right now uh one thing I learned when I was with Dave is match beats Roth Roth Beast traditional so first is match agreed you know what I'm saying and then after that it's match is free money like if you're not taking your match you're you're leaving money table you're crazy you know and so match beat the Roth beats traditional uh and traditional beats nothing so you want to be investing as much as you possibly can into safe areas and then I think from there too man I mean there's other things you can invest into if you want to have play money and try cool great but those are the foundations that I believe it yeah and I think even if you're doing having Play money to invest into other things yeah it needs to be a smaller percentage absolutely and probably only after you max out those first few buckets teaching good I did the crypto play and I was scared and I don't like crypto but I was like you know what let me just play $100 and I started seeing it go up I said put $20 back it started going up okay I'm put $10 in there but I never went and just put five 10 15 $220,000 in there because I it wasn't something that I felt comfortable doing and with my play money watch this I put all of that I'll say not all of it I'll say about at least 90% of it play money back into me so I put it back into my business back into my education back into masterminds and groups because I I am the number one investment that I can make I'm I'm better than a match I'm better than a 401k because I can grow me faster than anything else and if I'm growing an evolving I'm going to invest better I'm going to be wiser with my money and so what I what I tell everyone yeah if you want to have play money inste for buying a pair of Jordans you want to go put that into the you know to the crypto Bitcoin currency I'm cool great with that but when you have some real play money money you have some margin the best investments like you said is Max out everything that you can on the safe side get aggressive a little bit with it on the safe side but then what are you investing back into yourself that can grow a business that you own that you have control over that builds you a legacy and that's that's the season that I'm in right now is what am I building that while I'm sleeping while I'm on sabatical for a month I'm still generating income and to me I get excited about that just as much as I get excited about when I go into a 401k and when I go into the IRA and I don't really go in there that much anymore because I don't want to see the ups and the Downs because you know when you see the Downs like wait a minute you want to pull out and so I just go in there once a year when I meet my financial advisor and every time I'll be honest with you every time I meet my financial advisor now the numbers always up but when I was looking at it like every month I was up down I'm like oh Lord and I was like why am I doing this to myself and so I stopped doing that but I will tell you something we haven't talked about that I love doing High savings accounts now when I go into that every month I do go into that every month and I see those dividends as deposited to my account I'm like well look at God come like that's my date money right there how you doing I don't touch that money because it flips but I think that's something that a lot of people are sleeping on too they're putting their money into these bank accounts the savings account only getting 0.3% when right now I'm getting 5.2% of my account and I love it and I have a good a good in that savings account and I love seeing respectfully a good amount of money that's a positive to that account every mon yeah and I love that CDs you should also look into because I think right now you can get above 5% for these CDs too man listen I like CDs I don't have any myself because you know you gota you got to let it sit there for a long time but I mean I think at this season of my life what's wrong with that but what a lot of people don't realize about the CDs is they think your money is locked in there if you get a 12-month CD your money is locked in there for for 12 months it's not necessarily so you can pull the money out and you're never going to lose the principle so if you put $110,000 into CD you're never going to go below that if anything the penalty just means they'll take away a little of the interest you've earned but it's not like your money's locked away forever so I put a lot of my money in CDs okay and then sometimes I do have to break the CDs but it's like okay they'll take interest that wasn't really mine anyways so it doesn't matter so break break that down a little bit more for me so like if I put 10,000 in there and three months from now I need 2,000 I can go pull the $2,000 out yes and depending on where you opened your CD they might take a bit of a penalty but the penalty is just on the interest that you've earned usually in the three months prior oh I got you so if I put 10,000 in and I earned let's say 600 in interest I'mma pull the 2,000 out they made pull 50 from the $600 of interest but not from the principle what I put in yeah h but like everything that we talked about it's negotiable so I had a CD with I don't know $100,000 in it okay and I had to pull it out because I wanted to buy a house and they were going to charge me the penalty of the interest I earned was something like $3,000 so I negotiated my way out of it to pay $0 in penalty so how did you do that and I now this is new for me right here yeah because what you say is they ultimately want these Banks want you as a client and you say look look I have a house that I have to pay for right now so I have to take the money out of the CD but you know me I've been a customer for many many years and as soon as I have that money again it's going straight into CD so could you please wave this penalty this time and I've had this happen multiple times where they just say Yes it doesn't hurt them to let you to release the CD but it does hurt them if you're so upset about this penalty that they lose you as a customer and you bring your business somewhere else you're right because if they're only looking at at the cd part but then you got six figures over here in your savings for the bank or you got six figures in your checking account and you take all of that over the CD that's good that's good but everything with your bank I negotiated like sometimes I accidentally spend on credit cards that have a foreign transaction fees in foreign countries so I'll negotiate that away overdraft fees you can negotiate call up your bank negotiate anything and everything and so but you you taught me something about the CDs that I didn't know uh as far as negotiating uh the the interest and the penalty for withdrawing early and I I Tred to avoid all penalties at all cost but I'm gonna do that I'm go I'm G open up a CD tomorrow you should before this show is even aired I'm I'm G open up a CD another thing you can do is open up a do a CD ladder so essentially you open up a 3mon CD a 6mon CD 12 month and 18mon okay so that those CDs will mature at the 3-month Mark six-month Mark 12-month Mark and it's nice to just always know that okay my next CD will mature at this stage yep now is that with your bank or you do that with like a an investing firm I do it with with my Navy Federal Credit Union yeah I love Navy Federal that was a credit union who I told him about wait M yeah I love Navy Federal my dad was in the Air Force so are you serious yeah my dad was in Army and so Army my stepdad was um my stepdad was Marines and my my dad was in the Army and so Navy Federal is is in our family oh I love it okay then I'll I'll tell you another secret oh what's the secret talk to us so for Navy Federal and I don't know if this applies other credit unions other Banks but for Navy Federal if you open a CD even if you just put $100 in it that locks in the interest rate so if the interest rate right now that they're offering is 5% put open up a $100 CD and then 10 months from now or five months from now you can put more money into that but you're guarantee that interest rate still that's definitely not working for my bank I won't say the name of the bank but that's not happening at my bank I did not know that because like we all know interest rates go up and down and so if the interest rate starts to go down you still have that CD open that's locked in and you can add more money to it and then it goes back to like hey if you put $10,000 into it but then you need to take out 2,000 you're just going to lose money off of the interest but not off of the principal yeah but you locked in it to 5% per se if that was the number exactly so even if like if you put $100 in just and you need to take money out just take $50 out so you still have $50 in and is locked in the rate wow man I love it I I love C I'm going to Navy Federal when I get home because that's that's just beautiful you know I like I said I just CD I just I've stayed away from them a little bit only because I don't want to lock up my money and if I was like if I'm going to lock it up I may as well just put it into an investment account and just get more interest and but I mean the CDs Now are looking good to me the way that you're breaking this thing down it'll be good and one more thing that I was thinking about as we were talking is we know that negotiating with banks negotiating is very important sometimes on the other end of the line you get the wrong person maybe they're new they're scared to do things they don't have authority maybe they're in a bad mood so a lot of times like the first time I called to cancel that CD to pull out from that CD and they wanted to charge me thousands of dollars of that interest that I had earned the lady said sorry I'm going to charge you and I tried my negotiating and she's like sorry so then I was like okay I'll actually please leave it as is I'm going to call back and so I call back I get another person do the same thing and he says okay no problem we're going to wave that you get to keep all the interest so don't just take no the first no that you hear sometimes you just have the wrong person listen I'm you're you're right the hanging up and calling back and H up and calling back it really works when you negotiate and respect people in a process process of negotiating man you can get close to what you're aiming for and I think that is a secret to negotiating be kind and be respectful don't be rude don't say man you crazy no no hey thank you so much man thank you so much sir I understand you can't get there I totally understand and come back yeah and people always respect people who are respectful but if you're negotiating in a nasty and a disrespectful and a rude way I'll be honest with you I wouldn't want to work with you neither even I could get you to that price the fact that you were disrespectful and rude in the process of it I don't want to give it to you but if you're rude and kind and sweet and sound like Erica on her podcast then why not I'll give it to you and here's another thing Erica that a lot of people don't know is when I say do the research go on their website and see how long has that car been sitting on that lot because once you hit 90 to about 100 and something days they're actually losing money on that car because it's just sitting there there on a lot so I Honestly Love looking okay has this car been there for about 100 days Co that means price is priced too high so if I come in here with cash like hey I'm going give you a deal today pay cash they're actually a little excited about that because that car has been sitting there where you're probably saying Anthony how are they losing money on that car well if they have let's say they have $30,000 locked into this car and it's just been sitting there but that's $30,000 that they cannot use to go buy another car so if you go in there and sayy listen I'll give you $3,000 or I'll give you $228,000 for the car well they get $28,000 of their money back to go now shop for another car and get a better deal for the next time they sell the car so I'm always doing a research on how long has it been there if it just got there within the last week or two I'm not going to get the best deal because it's it's it's been there it just got there I me and so if it just got there within two weeks I'm definitely waiting for the last day of the month not the last three if it's the 30th of the month I'm going on the 30th of the month and why the 30th of the month it's commission based car dealers are not paid that's right most of the car dealerships not all most of the car dealerships I would say almost 80% of them are not paid a a salary monthly they'll get a stien like an advancement like $3 $500 a weeks a week but the majority of their money comes from the commission of the car and so I'm going the last day because I'm going to help them get a paycheck and that salesperson can't make the final decision it's going to go to the sales manager right they're going to fight hard for the sales manager to get this deal to go through because they want to eat next month and so the sales manager eats off of what they sell to so when it comes to negotiating last day of the month do your research and if it's been there longer than 90 days oh you're in a good sweet spot one of the things you were saying was that you invest in yourself and that's the best investment because you can guarantee that there's going to be a return on investment there what would you spend $1,000 on if you're investing on yourself I would spend $1,000 to sit in a room with you for one day to learn how you build your platform I would honestly spend $110,000 in a room with Erica to learn to learn how she built her platform because the thing is there's things that you teach on your podcast that's free and it's great but there's clearly clearly a sence science that you and your husband have have learned to really build the platform you have I think a lot of people sleep on that like well why would I spend much money to sit down with somebody to learn something man you put Bill Gates in this room you you put a Dave Ramsey in this room you put a you put a LeBron James you put a mark cubin in the room and it say hey I'm gonna spend a a day with you hey hey you put Jay-Z in this room you know what I'm saying and I'mma spend a day with you but it's gonna cost you 10 grand 15 grand $1,000 I'm I'm paying that money because of the wisdom that will come from that because of I I get to pick Erica I get to ask you specific questions like hey ER I mean you got millions on like Snapchat and millions on YouTube like what are you doing and you're helping other people make money like how what should I do and I'm I'm GNA get that information and so once I learn Erica oh man oh you can't stop me once you show me what to do once I learn what to do oh this is why I say I'm better than a 401k because now I'm going take that information and I'm going to go copy the cat just my own way and I'm going duplicate what you taught me in my own flavor with my own touch that's guaranteed income that's coming I can go to make 5 10 $20,000 in one month I'm not going to make that on a 401K right right now you know what I'm saying so for me investing into myself I'm looking for mentors I'm looking for coaches that I can invest into them in return they're investing into gaining my knowledge my experience so I can go out here and duplicate myself and teach that to my team teach that to my staff and learn and grow and evolve and that's the very first thing when I stepped out on my own I'll be honest man I spent I spent a lot of money to be a part of a mastermind that Mastermind group taught me so much that I I didn't know I'm sitting at tables with people who are making $100,000 a day and I'm like wait what excuse me I think one thing that we did well on this podcast today is we went very practical they went super practical Anthony do a b c in that order and watch you'll be making good money and I did a I did B I did C and I went back to them and said and see what you did because I now learn so much and I'm making good money so that's what I would invest into is just really the knowledge and the wisdom and getting a coach um and if you ever have a mastermind just let me know I'm going do it myself just get Lun with me anytime from this Mastermind that you paid for what was the one concrete piece of advice that made you the most money as soon as you implemented it communicating is not selling I am a great communicator I know how to get on the stage and I'm I'm a preacher at heart you know so I'm a cre I'm a Christian so I grew up went to Seminary school I know how to get on the stage and encourage people but encouraging people is not selling and I thought I can get on there and I could just just get them excited to buy into my product that didn't work I failed there's an art to selling there is a art of really learning why people want to buy and when you can learn that art combine that with your words of encouragement man the magic is there and so in there I had to really learn how to convince not really convince I had to learn how to sell properly on stage on my show and not sell in a grimy way CU I don't want to be that guy but I want to be authentic with what I'm selling but I also want to make sure that I'm selling way that's good right there I want to make sure that I'm selling in a way that convinces you that you need this like there's something in you that's saying I need something like this I need to do better at showing that I have that I wasn't good at doing that and so there was this one guy he literally coached me for uh six months and I paid him about $3,000 a month to be my sales coach and he taught me like hey here's how you get someone's felt need and when you can understand their felt need and show that have the answer to that felt need you have the solution to their problem you're selling like crazy and I mean the first time the very first month that we launched with him being my sales coach we did over $200,000 in sales and I'm like wow but again I paid to be in that room when I got into that room not everyone in the room could really help me but I found the people in the room that I could help one be a service to and who they can help me and man it that it's just been a great and I just give him some love it's a Wellspring group you know it's a great group of people young entrepreneurs who are uh Christian Believers and said hey we want to help build a kingdom and help make Kingdom Millionaires and man it's just been a blessing I love that it was a good thing sales I I hate selling can I be honest I hate selling I hate it I because I'm like I wish I could do what I do for free and still live the life that I want to live but I mean it's like I never want to be the guy that's a grimy salesperson but because of him I learned how to how to sell and feel good about what I'm selling and that's that has helped me out a whole lot uh because I have some of my platform and then it's not generating income that that was rough but I think we both have a similar mentality and business format here where 99% of the content that we put out is free yes anyone can access it and then just 1% of the content for people who want to go even deeper with us they can buy your impact Creator Society or they can buy my 3D money and those are just for the 1% of people who want to go deeper but for the majority of people our content is always going to be free and that's how we have the impact that we want to have right absolutely I believe in giving away as much as I possibly can for free and even My Philosophy is if I do sell something it needs to be super affordable because you know we both teach our people to be wise and good students of their money so I can't tell someone to budget but then I'm charging them a $155,000 product it just doesn't make sense so my product is like my IC uh impact creative Society program is only like $67 a month that's affordable um but it's going to generate you income so it's like for me I try to give as much away for free as long as I possibly can but at the end of the day both of us you know you're married I'm trying to get married one day we got to eat too and so we got to make products that is worth your while to invest in and that's one thing that we're very big on our team it's like is this product worth what we're going to charge and if if that answer is yes we won't charge it it needs to be worth more then what you're going to pay if it's worth more than that fee then we have a good product if it's only worth that product then yeah we don't we're not going to sell it we need to go back to the drawing board and come out with something that you feel like when you get it in your hands it's just wow thank you a and that's that's one thing we're working on now all right let's do a little rapid fire around all right let's do it yeah yeah yeah okay if someone says I want to be a millionaire what are the three things that they have to learn in order to become a millionaire ooh uh millionaire One Vision you got to have a vision of where you're going aim at nothing you hit that all the time so number one you got to have a vision and clear Direction Number Two um you gota I think at the end of the day you got to figure out a business that you can run and own yourself and number three My Philosophy and I'm not looking at Erica when I say this is you got to learn how to not have as lot of debt you can't have a lot of debt okay that those are my three things Vision business owner avoid debt good okay someone I don't it's not like I like I think it's I think using credit cards in a smart way I got to bring her on my show we got to have her talk about it okay next if someone has so Much Death that they are feeling hopeless what do you say to them I understand I'm going to give them empathy from the very beginning I believe empathy the supersedes the feeling it just like okay wait I'm not alone in this and while I only had $35,000 worth of debt I would tell them like I still felt the weight of it but tomorrow can be different and I tell everyone don't look at the large amount of debt look at the first thing in front of you that you could attack right now and then the next day look at the next thing and eventually when you know it when you look up you're out of debt you know um so give yourself Grace get on a plan find a plan that you could follow uh whether that's a Dave Ramy plan my plan Erica plan whatever that plan is you find a plan that you like and that you can stick with stick with that plan right and then from there man your life will be different and I tell this everyone you have to be willing to be uncomfortable for a season to change the rest of your life and the reason why people stay in debt is because they're not willing to be uncomfortable they honestly like being the Comfort the the uncomfort they have now has become comfortable it's it's become the norm I'm telling you no you can change yourself 12 24 months be aggressive and you think yourself in two years that you were willing to be uncomfortable and you took it one step at a time that's good okay if someone says I am so inspired by this what are the three things that you want them to do this month for their money oh man uh number one sit down and write a vision for your money and a vision for your life right what is a vision for your life hey I want to send my kids off to college uh you know with with no debt cool great does that rep is it in your budget are you saving for your college fund are you investing into a 529 we didn't even talk about that you know we can't talk about everything on the show man this is good stuff but it's like you if you if you're inspired today have a plan for your life have a plan for your vision uh for your money and then two look at your debt and start seeing where can I start eliminating debt from worth that debt snowball kill it and then three you know continue listen to Erica and then come over here and listen to me after you listen to Erica you know I'm on her show listen to her first and then come over here and listen to me and I promise you between us two uh your your finances are going to change love that this has been so much fun so we have a closing tradition okay the podcast is called Erica taught me but really today is all about Anthony O'Neal taught me so what do you want people to walk away saying Anthony taught me this I want you to say this I want you to you know ladies tell your boyfriend that Anthony O'Neal from the table with AO taught you that the caliber of our future my future is going to be determined by the choices I made today and the key word there is caliber we all have a future but what is the quality of that future and I want your quality to be amazing I want it to be fruitful I want it to be peaceful I want it to be prosperous but the only way we get there is by making better decisions today so ladies tell your boyfriend boyfriend tell your your girl husband wife you sit down and have the conversation to see hey how can we make our future better and that's what I hope you learned today on the iCal stuff that we taught you on how just making the right steps investing into these plans investing into yourself is going to change not just your future but your kids' future and your legacy from there that's so good thank you so much no thank you E I might ask you on your show you coming on my show when you come to my show a whatever you want let's do it man thank you no thank you if you've enjoyed the episode please take a moment to leave a review it really helps support what we're doing thanks for listening and I'll talk to you next Tuesday on on a brand new episode of Erica toau me
