January 22, 2024 • 36 mins
Adam Carroll is an influential figure in the realm of financial education, best known for his passionate advocacy for financial literacy and his innovative approaches to managing and understanding personal finance. His insightful documentary, "Broke, Busted, and Disgusted," casts a critical eye on the burgeoning crisis of student loan debt in the United States, offering a profound examination of the financial struggles that college students and recent graduates face in pursuit of education. Through compelling narratives and rigorous analysis, Carroll's work has sparked important conversations about the cost of college education and the true value of a degree.
Beyond the documentary, Adam Carroll has further contributed to the financial well-being of individuals through the development of the "Shred Method," a strategic approach to personal finance that emphasizes aggressive debt reduction and wealth building through savvy financial management. This method has been lauded for its practicality and effectiveness, guiding individuals toward financial freedom by teaching them how to eliminate debt swiftly and optimize their income for long-term financial health.
Carroll's multifaceted approach to financial education combines storytelling, strategic financial planning, and a deep understanding of the economic challenges facing individuals today. Through his documentary work, speaking engagements, and educational content, he has become a beacon for those seeking to navigate the complexities of personal finance with greater confidence and success.
As a speaker, author, and financial strategist, Adam Carroll's mission is to empower individuals to achieve financial independence and to make informed financial decisions that lead to a secure and prosperous future. His commitment to demystifying the financial landscape and providing actionable solutions has made him a respected and sought-after voice in the field of financial literacy.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:11):
Hi everyone, this is Juggling Entrepreneurship
Podcast and today we have AdamCarroll.
Adam is a book author of fourbooks and he produced an
award-winning documentary onstudent loan debt a very
interesting topic and also did aTED Talk which have millions of
views, and today we are goingto talk about his
(00:35):
entrepreneurship journey, hisparenthood journey and about his
very well-famous the ShredMethod.
So, hi, adam, welcome to ourpodcast.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
Thank you, Hema.
It's great to be here with youand I'm excited to talk about
the parent journey.
That's one of my favoritetopics of all time.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Yes, I'm very interested too, so I give a
little bit of a preview around acouple of accomplishments out
of millions that you havealready accomplished, but would
you like to add more?
Speaker 2 (01:11):
You know it's funny, you're too kind, I think.
What I like to tell people isI'm a bit of a serial
entrepreneur and someone oncecalled me a mediapreneur,
because I like to create mediaand then turn around and sell
that in a variety of ways,whether that's speaking
engagements, books, ted Talks,documentaries and now software,
(01:34):
which I've kind of jumped intothe deep end on over the last
three years, but it's been awild ride.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
Great, so tell us, Adam.
We are a parent of threebeautiful children, so tell us
about your parenthood and whatactually motivated you to start
your entrepreneurship journey.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
So I have three kids.
They are currently 2018 and 16.
So two of my kids are incollege.
My youngest son is a sophomorein high school, so he is still
at home.
The other two are not in thehome anymore, they're out at
school.
But I'll tell you, hema, myjourney with being an
(02:19):
entrepreneur and being a parentcoincided the majority of their
life.
I mean, I think they were.
Probably.
I'd started another companywhen my second child was born,
so I had been an employee whenmy daughter was born, and then
my son.
I have two boys and a girl, somy daughter was first and I was
(02:41):
employee, and then I became anentrepreneur.
And I've pretty much been anentrepreneur ever since, and
I'll tell you that there arepros and cons.
Right, and I'm sure many ofyour guests will say the same.
The pro is I've been there forthem.
For a majority of the events,whether it's a concert, a play,
a basketball game, a golf meet,I'm able to be there and, as an
(03:05):
entrepreneur, freedom andflexibility is one of the values
that I hold most dear.
The negative side ofentrepreneurship are or negative
sides are a lot of late nights.
I mean, I tend to work onprojects and I work on them into
the wee hours of the night andsometimes I feel guilty about am
(03:27):
I not spending enough time withthem, particularly now that my
kids are at school?
My youngest is still home.
I feel like I have this limitedamount of time to spend with
him and I'm trying my hardest tosqueeze every moment I can with
him before he's also out of thehouse.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
That's definitely a challenge that's not going to go
away anytime in the near futurefor any of the parents.
But tell us, when did you getthis idea to start your
entrepreneurship journey?
Was there been an incident orany experience that helped you
(04:20):
to start this journey?
Speaker 2 (04:22):
Yeah, I would say that this probably came out in
therapy at some point for me,but one of my earliest memories
as a child was my mom made acomment of oh, your dad's had a
bad day at work.
And then she subsequently saidand then this could happen, and
then we could be out of our home.
(04:43):
And she made this super leapbetween my dad was having a bad
day at work and maybe he'd losehis job and then we'd be
homeless.
And today I know that's not howit works you don't lose your
job and you're homeless the nextday.
But then I found out that my dadhad been laid off from his job
(05:05):
and I think in that moment Isaid to myself as a child I'm
assuming this that I didn't wantto work for someone else
because they would have fullcontrol over whether or not I
would be employed and be able tolive in this home.
And so, deep down, deep inside,I always knew that I wanted to
be an entrepreneur, I wanted tocontrol my own thing.
(05:25):
But it wasn't until I was about28 where I had this flash of I
know exactly what I want to godo, and I knew, from that point
forward, everything that I hadbeen doing in my professional
career had set me up to go dothat.
So I think there are somepeople that tiptoe their way
(05:45):
into entrepreneurship and I feellike at 28, I pulled the
ripcord and went and just hadlong and did it.
But it wasn't just for me, itwas for my family, it was for
future generations because deepdown I believe that when you are
in control of your own business, you're in control of your own
(06:07):
destiny, and that's been adriving factor for me for the
last 20 years.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
I think it's very powerful, but it's also very
real that most of the peopledon't really understand.
Most of the people think thatthe entrepreneurship journey is
like a movie you know in a flasheverything would be successful
and so on.
But in reality it takes a lotof taking risks, a lot of
(06:39):
failures in the beginning, a lotof rethinking and
re-strategizing over and, overand over again.
Tell us about the shred method.
Did you start yourentrepreneurship journey as the
(07:00):
student loan, trying to solvethe problem, or did you
eventually get into that shredmethod?
Speaker 2 (07:08):
Yeah, it's an interesting question and through
line, because where I startedin my career really ultimately
helped shape where I am today.
And when I started as anentrepreneur, my goal really was
to educate people about money.
I wanted to create aneducational platform that I
could go out and help presentideas around saving and
(07:30):
investing and help changepeople's mindsets around money.
I knew enough to be dangerous,I think, at the beginning, and
the more experience that I had,hema, the more I realized that I
was slowly developing theskillset that would lead to
where I'm at today.
So for me, the iterations thathappened around business were I
(07:53):
was dealing with a lot ofcollege-age students early on.
I wrote books.
I would go present on collegecampuses, I was consulting with
them in their financial aiddepartments.
That led to me working withbanks and credit unions.
My work with banks and creditunions led to me doing the
(08:13):
documentary on student loan debtand really helping people
understand the causes andrepercussions of student loans.
And then I had this break inthe action where I started a
mortgage company and I had beena broker for a period of time
helping people find mortgagesand buy and refinance homes.
(08:35):
But there was something in themidst of that that it was like
an aha moment that I realized Iwasn't really helping people
when I was refinancing theirdebt, because all I was doing
was resetting the clock back tozero.
They had maybe generated someequity in their property and
then, when I refinanced them,they just went back to starting
(08:57):
the clock at zero.
And that's where the ShredMethod came in, and it's known
by some other different names,but we have enhanced what I
think the process is and put apiece of software behind it that
actually teaches people what todo with their income to create
greater efficiency, allowingthem to pay off their mortgage
(09:18):
in record time, and for mostfolks that's between three and
seven years.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
That's interesting and I'm also guessing you had a
lot of backlash when you cameinitially with that method.
Talk us about that journey.
I think you talked about themotivation behind creating that
Shred Method, but tell us aboutthe backlash and what is that
core principle that people haveto adapt to, why it's very
(09:48):
useful for the people,especially for families who have
kids, who are planning for thefuture and so on.
Speaker 2 (09:53):
Yeah, you know, the biggest backlash or the hurdle
that I've got had to come overwith this business is we're a
debt laden and, I would say,debt addicted society and we
believe that debt is normal,natural and good.
And I'm not saying it's not.
(10:13):
I think debt can be a reallyuseful tool.
At the same time, I think thatthere are a lot of folks out
there that they have used debtto acquire all of the things
they want and then they wake upone day and realize I'm not
getting ahead as fast as Ishould be.
Why is that?
And we often point out to peoplethat the two greatest expenses
(10:35):
that we'll ever have in life aretaxes and the interest expense
on debt, and it's one of those.
Actually, both of them aresomewhat overlooked.
We don't really think intentlyabout the fact that we have
property taxes, income taxes,sales tax, gas tax, liquor tax,
travel tax.
I mean that we are taxed onliterally everything, so it's
(10:58):
one of the greatest expenses wehave.
Secondarily, the interestexpense on debt is something
that we don't normally payattention to.
We just go well, I can affordmy house payment and I can
afford my car payment and I canswing the minimum payment or a
little bit extra on my creditcard debt, but in reality that
could account for, for mostpeople, $20,000, $30,000,
(11:21):
$40,000 a year in interestexpense, and what we're trying
to do is teach them how to clawback some of that interest so
that they could have the fundsnecessary when their kids need
braces or they want to take alavish vacation or you want to
write a check for collegebecause you can cash flow
college.
That's ideally what we wantpeople to be able to do, and
(11:46):
those that we catch early enough, they'll experience that it's
like I can't believe I'm writinga check for tuition.
I can't believe I just wrote acheck for my new car.
That's the kind of power thatwe help people create.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
Yeah, that is very, very intriguing and intimidating
at the same time.
So let's talk about you.
You briefly mentioned that thebooks that you have wrote.
It's kind of like a buildingblocks for the shred method what
are?
Tell us a little bit about thefour books that you have wrote,
(12:22):
and starting from book numberone, and how it actually evolved
to your latest book.
Speaker 2 (12:28):
Yeah, the first book is called Winning the Money Game
and the subtitle is a rule bookto achieving financial success
for young people, and the reasonit was written early on was it
was going to be a high schooland college curriculum.
So that book I think at lastcount it's probably sold
(12:52):
somewhere in the neighborhood of30,000 degrees, which I think
by most indications would makeit a best seller.
And yet the problem is themajority of those have been sold
in boxes of 100 to high schoolsand colleges around the country
.
So that book led to a book thatit's kind of funny to say it,
(13:15):
but I wrote it on two longairline flights across the
United States and that book iscalled 30 Days to 1K.
The idea behind that book waspeople were telling me it was
hard to save $1,000.
And I was like it's not thathard to save $1,000.
Let me write all the ways thatyou can do that in 30 days.
And so that book was aself-published deal through
(13:38):
Amazon.
My third book is called Masteryof Money for Students, which is
a little bit higher level Iwould say that's college,
certainly college level andmaybe a little beyond, also used
in a variety of differentcolleges and universities as a
curriculum.
And then my latest book iscalled the Build a Bigger Life
(13:59):
Manifesto, and this has sort ofbeen my life's work over the
last five years of teachingpeople how to build a bigger
life, not a bigger lifestyle.
And a bigger life for me is theidea of time with family and
travel and getting to practiceyour guitar or your piano just
(14:19):
because you want to.
You know, having free time todo what you want, as opposed to
having to work all the time topay for the stuff you have.
And the book itself was kind ofa labor of love, and I finished
it in Sorrento, italy, in 2019.
So it's got a lot of greatmemories just in the completion
(14:40):
of it.
Speaker 1 (14:43):
That's really good.
I think it's kind of I can seelike the maturity level of the
books, coming from book numberone to two to three, and I think
it's covering the differentdimensions of what can you do
the best in life, including themoney savings idea.
(15:03):
You're not just saying like,hey, these are the principles
just for students, but alsosaying like, look at the life,
as you can save 100, you knowyou can save $1,000.
It's not that hard.
But also what is veryinteresting is, I think, your
third book, where you mentionedthat having a better life and
(15:26):
how to save more money out ofthe student loans what most of
the parents would be interestedwho are listening to the podcast
.
So let's let a bit dig into.
Starting with, what are thecommon myths or mistakes that
parents do in terms of planningfor their, for the students,
(15:50):
education and in terms ofplanning for the student loan.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
I think the most, the one that stands out the most
for me, hema, is not being incommunication with your student
about who actually is paying forschool or how it's being paid
for.
And you know, we could betalking to any level of
entrepreneur today, right, thesecould be folks just getting
started or wanting to startentrepreneurs, we might call
(16:18):
them, and those who are supersuccessful and can stroke a
check for their kids, collegeand everywhere in between.
The challenge that I saw indoing the documentary on student
loan debt and the amount ofwork that I did on campuses was
that I would meet students allthe time that when I asked them
either how much will you have instudent loan debt or how is
(16:40):
college being paid for, they'dbe like I have no idea.
My parents just did it, so theydidn't know how much they were
borrowing.
So if that was the case, maybetheir parents filled out the
FAFSA and approved the financialaid package.
Or if they were in the knowabout the financial aid package,
but it'd been three years orfour years, they had no idea how
(17:04):
much the loan had grown to interms of interest and expense,
and I think, from a parentalperspective, one of the worst
things we can do for our kids isnot clue them into what they're
actually getting themselvesinto, because there were also a
number of students that said Idon't know, my parents are
paying for it.
And then when they graduated,their parents are like surprise,
(17:26):
here's your parent plus payment, right?
Or here's your Stafford loanpayment.
And the kids were caught offguard.
They thought their parents werepaying for it.
So in our household, one of thestrategies that we implemented
that your listeners mightappreciate is at the dinner
table from the time my kids werepreteen.
I would say hey guys, what doyou think it costs to go to USC?
(17:48):
Hey, what do you think it costsfor Purdue?
What do you think it costs togo to Notre Dame?
What do you think Harvard costs?
And the kids would guess and Iwould look it up or we'd use
Alexa or whatever to find outwhat total cost of attendance
was.
But I wanted my kids tounderstand what college costs
(18:09):
were before they ever startedthinking through well, how would
we ever pay for that?
Because it's hard for a 14, 15,16 year old kid to fathom what
$50,000 a year looks like,particularly borrowed over four
years.
That might become 200 or 220 bythe time interest is calculated
.
So I think the biggest pitfallto avoid is not sharing more
(18:37):
with your kids about how thatprocess is gonna unfold.
Speaker 1 (18:43):
I think that is, I think, the first and important
step communication with thestudents so that they have an
idea what they would be goingthrough.
It's not something that iscoming for free or coming easily
, but there is a lot of amountof work from the parent side,
(19:03):
but also, potentially, if youdidn't plan properly, from the
student side too, from the kidsside, once they graduated.
Let's talk about yourdocumentary, which is very, very
interesting, but before hoppinginto the documentary, let's
talk about the book.
You said your first book havebeen distributed in high schools
(19:26):
and colleges, or, okay, is itpart of your strategy, part of
your thinking, to say that, hey,you know what.
This book really needs to go inthe hands of the high schoolers
, really needs to go in thehands of the college students.
They really need to know thatother side of the table.
Was that something your idea?
Speaker 2 (19:48):
It was, you know, my first book.
I probably didn't have thatmuch forethought, you know it
was sort of like we have a storyto tell.
Let's tell it by the third book, the Master of Money for
Students.
I had been on college campusesfor probably a decade and I had
heard so many questions and youknow, questions from students
(20:10):
but also then the feedback I wasgetting or answers I was
getting from my questions tothem.
You know, just as an example,hema, many students.
They didn't know the differencebetween a 1099 job and a W2 job
.
And it may just be semantics,it may just be the language
you're using.
They didn't understand.
But I wanted that book toillustrate these are 1099 type
(20:33):
careers, these are W2 typecareers.
This is how you invest money.
This is the difference betweena Roth IRA, a SEP IRA, a 401K.
I wanted them to know thatbecause it felt like the
vocabulary that society is usingwhen they graduate, maybe
unbeknownst to them when theygraduate.
So there were a lot of recentgrads who would say, yeah, in my
(20:58):
first week on the job theyasked me about a 401K but I
declined it because I didn'twant any money taken out of my
paycheck and the book really wasintended to help educate
students about the power of a401k and articulate why they
should be starting early andbuilding the right habits from a
young age and things like that.
(21:18):
So I think it would be great tosay that I had this idea, you
know, longstanding plan.
But I will say that I havestudents who've said I got your
green book in high school, I gotthe black book in college, we
watched your TED Talk in my highschool financial literacy class
and we watched your documentaryin, you know, in my junior
(21:40):
college class or my collegeclass.
I literally have had people sayyes, you've been along for
almost every step of the way andfor me, like there's no greater
satisfaction than knowingsomething I put into the world
some time ago is still touchingpeople you know, here or there.
And, candidly, I like goinginto half price books every now
(22:00):
and again and seeing if one ofmy books is on the shelf.
But then I see that I inscribethis to somebody.
And who do I need to call outon this?
Because you know they sold mybook, but I don't blame them.
They got two or three bucks outof it, I suppose.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
But I think I'm pretty sure after hearing this
podcast, people would beshuffling through the
bookshelves and online to findyour books.
For sure, and to the audiencewe will definitely put all the
book names and the documentary,the names, the TED Talk, the
links and TED Talk what inspiredyou did?
(22:36):
Did you get like theoverwhelming requests from
people to give us a TED Talk,you know, so that we can sink in
all along that?
Or was the TED Talk also on theshred method or something
different?
Speaker 2 (22:49):
Yeah, it was something different.
And I wish that I could say itwas it was like all these
requests coming in to do oneReally a good friend of mine.
He said what's next for you?
And this was like back in 2013or 14.
And I said you know, I feellike I want to do a TED Talk.
(23:10):
I don't know what on yet, but Iknow I'm going to do a TED Talk
.
And he said well, how are yougoing to do it?
And I said I have no idea.
I'm going to leave it up to theuniverse.
I'm going to ask for divineguidance on it.
And this friend said why don'tyou put at the bottom of your
email under a double dashed lineit is my goal to one day grace
(23:32):
a TED stage.
If you could help me with that,I'd be forever in your debt.
And so I did that.
I put it as my signature lineand I sent out email after email
after email, and lo and behold,about eight to nine weeks later
, I got my first request for aTEDx event in Milwaukee,
wisconsin, and then, about fourweeks after that, I got another
(23:55):
almost identical request for anevent at the London Business
School in the UK and so ithappened.
And it happened sort of I wouldcall it the law of attraction
and action for me.
But the TED Talk that wentviral.
You know what really inspiredme about that was my work on
(24:17):
college campuses and all thesestudents that they didn't have a
clue what they were doing withmoney, and it occurred to me
that money just wasn't real.
They were in this environmentwhere they just swipe their
university ID or use athumbprint to get into the
lunchroom.
And then I came home one dayfrom a trip on a Friday,
saturday morning we're playing agame of Monopoly as a family
(24:40):
and I noticed that my kids werejust playing outside the rules
of the game.
They just wanted to roll thedice and move the pieces.
So the money was likeirrelevant to them and I went oh
the money's irrelevant.
I wonder, if the money were real, would it be relevant to them?
And so that inspired the talk,which is basically me playing a
cash game on Monopoly with mykids and the lessons we learned
(25:04):
from that.
You know, having 10 grand incold hard cash on the kitchen
table.
Speaker 1 (25:10):
That is.
You know, it's sometimes reallyinteresting and funny how we
get the motivation from thelittle cute parts of our life
and how it blossoms into a wholenew fantastic idea, in your
case, for the chat talk.
So again, thanks a lot, adam,for this interview, for
(25:34):
motivation and again, I wouldsay, for a big reality check for
a lot of parents who would behere in this podcast, who will
be there, for planning for thekids future and how
communication is important, howplanning is important, how
having an open communicationwith the kids about how their
(25:55):
future going to be, what theywill be getting the tuition paid
and so on.
Thanks for watching this.
Wrap up this podcast, but withthree main important key
takeaways, adam.
What would your suggestionwould be for fellow
(26:16):
entrepreneurs?
We are not talking about theshred method, we are not talking
about your SME, but from oneparent entrepreneur to another,
what would your suggestion be?
What would be the three keypoints they have to remember to
get them going and motivated andkeep on going?
Speaker 2 (26:36):
I think, on the children perspective and raising
kids.
I met this gentleman one timewho his one son had a full ride
scholarship.
Both kids had a full ridescholarship to undergrad and
then they both received fullride scholarships, one to law
school, one to med school.
(26:57):
I was having coffee with thisgentleman and I said how did you
do that?
How does a parent inspire theirkids to do full ride on both of
those?
He said Adam, your childrenwill do pretty much whatever you
expect of them.
Be very clear in yourexpectations.
I love that idea With my kids.
(27:21):
One of the things that I saidwas it is my expectation Now I
had a lot of them around howwell they'll do in school,
academically and things likethat.
One of the things I said was Iexpect that you'll have an MBA
before you ever go to college.
An MBA was a massive bankaccount.
I was teaching them habits ofsaving and investing from the
(27:43):
time they were young, but Iwanted them to realize that by
the time they went to collegethey could easily have $5,000 or
$10,000 sitting on thesidelines or in investments.
All of them have done it.
I think there is some truth toyour children will do what you
expect of them.
I would encourage entrepreneursout there as a second tidbit or
(28:05):
point is have conversations withyour kids about how your
business works Specifically.
You might even ask them what doyou wonder about in mom's
business or dad's business?
What are the things that maybeyour friends ask?
What do you wonder about howthis business works?
Because they're not always thatinquisitive, but they're
(28:26):
something they're wonderingabout.
How did we take that nicevacation two years ago?
What did that cost?
How did we do that?
Was that a business expense?
How did you make it a businessexpense?
Those kinds of things.
Ask them what they wonder,because we want to inspire
curiosity in our kids around ourbusiness.
Then, last but not least and itgoes hand in hand with the other
(28:48):
two is, I feel like, being veryclear with kids about what the
vision is is important, becauseI think too many parents go
through their daily life withoutsharing what the vision for
this month or this quarter orthis year looks like for the
kids.
I like to sit down with myfamily at the beginning of the
(29:11):
year and say, listen, my visionfor the year looks like this.
This is what our vacations willlook like.
This is what I want ourweekends to be.
What do you want it to looklike?
I'm doing it for two reasonsOne, to set the vision for them.
And number two, to let themknow it's okay to have their own
, and if I know what theirvision is, I'm going to be 100%
(29:31):
supportive of helping themachieve that.
So those are my three.
Speaker 1 (29:39):
I think, very, very well articulated, to be frank
with you.
And next key takeaway forparents who are planning for the
kids to go to college, to havetheir own mortgage to pay, but
they also want to start planningfor the student loan or for the
(30:03):
student tuition fee savings andso on, is 529k better or are
there other best options, likeRoth IRA or right now we see the
teen related IRA options too?
What would be?
How can they decide which isbest?
(30:23):
What are the metrics they needto consider?
Speaker 2 (30:25):
Yeah, so much of this depends on do you see your
child going on to a four yearschool and how much schooling
might they require?
I wish this was like a superhard and fast answer.
Hey, ma, I'm not sure it'sgoing to be.
I can tell you what.
I can tell you what we did andit worked.
(30:46):
You know, we funded a 529 planas much as we could, as early as
we could, knowing that the ruleof 72 is in play, right, which
is, whatever your interest ratethat you're making on that money
is divided by, divided into 72,will tell you how many years it
will take to double your money.
(31:06):
And we figured that if we hadput enough away that it would
double twice, we'd have enoughfor at least two, maybe three
years of college.
And the assumption was that ourkids would probably get
scholarships, just givenacademically, how they'd done
and what we were really drivinghome for them was there's so
(31:27):
much free money for school.
It's going to be a priority foryou to go find it and we'll
help you, but you're going tofind free money for school.
And so you know, using thatplan, we used 529 plan money to
help fund the majority of theircollege career, and I believe
I'm going to knock on wood here,but I believe all three of them
(31:48):
will finish with no studentloans whatsoever and my
daughter's applying for amaster's program where she'll
get paid to go.
So I hope the other two dosomething similar.
We'll see, but I feel likewe've set them up, you know,
from a financial mindsetperspective and from a financial
perspective, to help them getthrough school with a limited
(32:11):
amount of stress.
Speaker 1 (32:12):
Yeah, and I think that's very, very important for
kids to know that there is,there are options for you to get
paid, for you to go to collegeand you need to find a way, you
need to be the best, in whateverway you can, to match that
expectations of the college.
And I think it's kind of likepitching your startup idea to
(32:38):
the investors.
I would say it in that way,saying like why you are unique
compared to the other 500applicants that are trying to
apply for the scholarships.
And last equation for youngentrepreneurs right, they might
(32:59):
be a parent of a baby or atoddler, or who want to start
their journey from a corporatenine to five job to hopping in,
or they might want to thinkabout a side hustle to start
with and then eventually go down.
What do you think is a veryimportant point?
(33:21):
The starting phase ofentrepreneurs have to learn or
have to keep it in mind whenthey start the journey.
Speaker 2 (33:35):
What comes to mind for me.
My answer to that question is Ithink that if it is one unit of
a couple, that they need to be100% on board with each other,
that this is what they're goingafter.
And that might mean, if thefemale is the entrepreneur and
(33:56):
the other partner is the spouse,okay with either having a job
or being stay at home, thatthere is time dedicated to build
that business and that they'resupportive of that time.
Because what I find in coupleswhere one is an entrepreneur
maybe they're raising kidstogether is that the
(34:16):
entrepreneur gets pulled awayfrom their entrepreneurial
duties into parenting and right,wrong or indifferent, it
happens.
but it's really important forone spouse to really protect the
time for that entrepreneur todevote time and energy and
attention to the business,because the level of focus and
the level of focus, time andeffort and energy that you put
(34:39):
into your business willtranslate to how much traction
and growth you have in thebusiness in short order, whereas
if it's very distracted, it'sgoing to take you a lot longer
and maybe you lose steam.
So I find that partners who arealigned on the vision, on the
commitment, on the expectations,they can go really far together
(35:01):
.
Speaker 1 (35:02):
Yeah, I do remember when I was trying to get the
tech startup and I want to quitmy corporate job to start my
tech startup, me and my husbandhad around like six months of
continuous discussion, or it'slike, are we sure, if I go this
(35:24):
way, then this is how our familylife would be, this is how our
finances would be, and it's noteasy.
It's not at all easy for parentswho want to even start the side
hustle or even go through theparent entrepreneurship journey.
And I mean a big kudos to allthe parents and entrepreneurs
who are there who are evenstarting as a side hustle,
(35:47):
because it's hard.
It's hard, yeah, because you'renot single.
You have your duties as aspouse, you have your duties as
a partner, you have your dutiesas a parent, and it's something
that is not easily ignoredbecause it's going to impact the
(36:07):
family overall.
So, thanks again, adam andeverybody.
Adam, carol, again, the authorof four books, the inventor of
thread method and parententrepreneur by himself.
So thank you, adam, once againfor your amazing episode and eye
(36:28):
opening facts around the shredmethod, the student loans and
mainly about the parententrepreneurship journey.
Speaker 2 (36:37):
Love it, Thank you.
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (36:40):
Thank you.
Hi everyone, this is Juggling Entrepreneurship
Podcast and today we have AdamCarroll.
Adam is a book author of fourbooks and he produced an
award-winning documentary onstudent loan debt a very
interesting topic and also did aTED Talk which have millions of
views, and today we are goingto talk about his
(00:35):
entrepreneurship journey, hisparenthood journey and about his
very well-famous the ShredMethod.
So, hi, adam, welcome to ourpodcast.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
Thank you, Hema.
It's great to be here with youand I'm excited to talk about
the parent journey.
That's one of my favoritetopics of all time.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Yes, I'm very interested too, so I give a
little bit of a preview around acouple of accomplishments out
of millions that you havealready accomplished, but would
you like to add more?
Speaker 2 (01:11):
You know it's funny, you're too kind, I think.
What I like to tell people isI'm a bit of a serial
entrepreneur and someone oncecalled me a mediapreneur,
because I like to create mediaand then turn around and sell
that in a variety of ways,whether that's speaking
engagements, books, ted Talks,documentaries and now software,
(01:34):
which I've kind of jumped intothe deep end on over the last
three years, but it's been awild ride.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
Great, so tell us, Adam.
We are a parent of threebeautiful children, so tell us
about your parenthood and whatactually motivated you to start
your entrepreneurship journey.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
So I have three kids.
They are currently 2018 and 16.
So two of my kids are incollege.
My youngest son is a sophomorein high school, so he is still
at home.
The other two are not in thehome anymore, they're out at
school.
But I'll tell you, hema, myjourney with being an
(02:19):
entrepreneur and being a parentcoincided the majority of their
life.
I mean, I think they were.
Probably.
I'd started another companywhen my second child was born,
so I had been an employee whenmy daughter was born, and then
my son.
I have two boys and a girl, somy daughter was first and I was
(02:41):
employee, and then I became anentrepreneur.
And I've pretty much been anentrepreneur ever since, and
I'll tell you that there arepros and cons.
Right, and I'm sure many ofyour guests will say the same.
The pro is I've been there forthem.
For a majority of the events,whether it's a concert, a play,
a basketball game, a golf meet,I'm able to be there and, as an
(03:05):
entrepreneur, freedom andflexibility is one of the values
that I hold most dear.
The negative side ofentrepreneurship are or negative
sides are a lot of late nights.
I mean, I tend to work onprojects and I work on them into
the wee hours of the night andsometimes I feel guilty about am
(03:27):
I not spending enough time withthem, particularly now that my
kids are at school?
My youngest is still home.
I feel like I have this limitedamount of time to spend with
him and I'm trying my hardest tosqueeze every moment I can with
him before he's also out of thehouse.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
That's definitely a challenge that's not going to go
away anytime in the near futurefor any of the parents.
But tell us, when did you getthis idea to start your
entrepreneurship journey?
Was there been an incident orany experience that helped you
(04:20):
to start this journey?
Speaker 2 (04:22):
Yeah, I would say that this probably came out in
therapy at some point for me,but one of my earliest memories
as a child was my mom made acomment of oh, your dad's had a
bad day at work.
And then she subsequently saidand then this could happen, and
then we could be out of our home.
(04:43):
And she made this super leapbetween my dad was having a bad
day at work and maybe he'd losehis job and then we'd be
homeless.
And today I know that's not howit works you don't lose your
job and you're homeless the nextday.
But then I found out that my dadhad been laid off from his job
(05:05):
and I think in that moment Isaid to myself as a child I'm
assuming this that I didn't wantto work for someone else
because they would have fullcontrol over whether or not I
would be employed and be able tolive in this home.
And so, deep down, deep inside,I always knew that I wanted to
be an entrepreneur, I wanted tocontrol my own thing.
(05:25):
But it wasn't until I was about28 where I had this flash of I
know exactly what I want to godo, and I knew, from that point
forward, everything that I hadbeen doing in my professional
career had set me up to go dothat.
So I think there are somepeople that tiptoe their way
(05:45):
into entrepreneurship and I feellike at 28, I pulled the
ripcord and went and just hadlong and did it.
But it wasn't just for me, itwas for my family, it was for
future generations because deepdown I believe that when you are
in control of your own business, you're in control of your own
(06:07):
destiny, and that's been adriving factor for me for the
last 20 years.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
I think it's very powerful, but it's also very
real that most of the peopledon't really understand.
Most of the people think thatthe entrepreneurship journey is
like a movie you know in a flasheverything would be successful
and so on.
But in reality it takes a lotof taking risks, a lot of
(06:39):
failures in the beginning, a lotof rethinking and
re-strategizing over and, overand over again.
Tell us about the shred method.
Did you start yourentrepreneurship journey as the
(07:00):
student loan, trying to solvethe problem, or did you
eventually get into that shredmethod?
Speaker 2 (07:08):
Yeah, it's an interesting question and through
line, because where I startedin my career really ultimately
helped shape where I am today.
And when I started as anentrepreneur, my goal really was
to educate people about money.
I wanted to create aneducational platform that I
could go out and help presentideas around saving and
(07:30):
investing and help changepeople's mindsets around money.
I knew enough to be dangerous,I think, at the beginning, and
the more experience that I had,hema, the more I realized that I
was slowly developing theskillset that would lead to
where I'm at today.
So for me, the iterations thathappened around business were I
(07:53):
was dealing with a lot ofcollege-age students early on.
I wrote books.
I would go present on collegecampuses, I was consulting with
them in their financial aiddepartments.
That led to me working withbanks and credit unions.
My work with banks and creditunions led to me doing the
(08:13):
documentary on student loan debtand really helping people
understand the causes andrepercussions of student loans.
And then I had this break inthe action where I started a
mortgage company and I had beena broker for a period of time
helping people find mortgagesand buy and refinance homes.
(08:35):
But there was something in themidst of that that it was like
an aha moment that I realized Iwasn't really helping people
when I was refinancing theirdebt, because all I was doing
was resetting the clock back tozero.
They had maybe generated someequity in their property and
then, when I refinanced them,they just went back to starting
(08:57):
the clock at zero.
And that's where the ShredMethod came in, and it's known
by some other different names,but we have enhanced what I
think the process is and put apiece of software behind it that
actually teaches people what todo with their income to create
greater efficiency, allowingthem to pay off their mortgage
(09:18):
in record time, and for mostfolks that's between three and
seven years.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
That's interesting and I'm also guessing you had a
lot of backlash when you cameinitially with that method.
Talk us about that journey.
I think you talked about themotivation behind creating that
Shred Method, but tell us aboutthe backlash and what is that
core principle that people haveto adapt to, why it's very
(09:48):
useful for the people,especially for families who have
kids, who are planning for thefuture and so on.
Speaker 2 (09:53):
Yeah, you know, the biggest backlash or the hurdle
that I've got had to come overwith this business is we're a
debt laden and, I would say,debt addicted society and we
believe that debt is normal,natural and good.
And I'm not saying it's not.
(10:13):
I think debt can be a reallyuseful tool.
At the same time, I think thatthere are a lot of folks out
there that they have used debtto acquire all of the things
they want and then they wake upone day and realize I'm not
getting ahead as fast as Ishould be.
Why is that?
And we often point out to peoplethat the two greatest expenses
(10:35):
that we'll ever have in life aretaxes and the interest expense
on debt, and it's one of those.
Actually, both of them aresomewhat overlooked.
We don't really think intentlyabout the fact that we have
property taxes, income taxes,sales tax, gas tax, liquor tax,
travel tax.
I mean that we are taxed onliterally everything, so it's
(10:58):
one of the greatest expenses wehave.
Secondarily, the interestexpense on debt is something
that we don't normally payattention to.
We just go well, I can affordmy house payment and I can
afford my car payment and I canswing the minimum payment or a
little bit extra on my creditcard debt, but in reality that
could account for, for mostpeople, $20,000, $30,000,
(11:21):
$40,000 a year in interestexpense, and what we're trying
to do is teach them how to clawback some of that interest so
that they could have the fundsnecessary when their kids need
braces or they want to take alavish vacation or you want to
write a check for collegebecause you can cash flow
college.
That's ideally what we wantpeople to be able to do, and
(11:46):
those that we catch early enough, they'll experience that it's
like I can't believe I'm writinga check for tuition.
I can't believe I just wrote acheck for my new car.
That's the kind of power thatwe help people create.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
Yeah, that is very, very intriguing and intimidating
at the same time.
So let's talk about you.
You briefly mentioned that thebooks that you have wrote.
It's kind of like a buildingblocks for the shred method what
are?
Tell us a little bit about thefour books that you have wrote,
(12:22):
and starting from book numberone, and how it actually evolved
to your latest book.
Speaker 2 (12:28):
Yeah, the first book is called Winning the Money Game
and the subtitle is a rule bookto achieving financial success
for young people, and the reasonit was written early on was it
was going to be a high schooland college curriculum.
So that book I think at lastcount it's probably sold
(12:52):
somewhere in the neighborhood of30,000 degrees, which I think
by most indications would makeit a best seller.
And yet the problem is themajority of those have been sold
in boxes of 100 to high schoolsand colleges around the country
.
So that book led to a book thatit's kind of funny to say it,
(13:15):
but I wrote it on two longairline flights across the
United States and that book iscalled 30 Days to 1K.
The idea behind that book waspeople were telling me it was
hard to save $1,000.
And I was like it's not thathard to save $1,000.
Let me write all the ways thatyou can do that in 30 days.
And so that book was aself-published deal through
(13:38):
Amazon.
My third book is called Masteryof Money for Students, which is
a little bit higher level Iwould say that's college,
certainly college level andmaybe a little beyond, also used
in a variety of differentcolleges and universities as a
curriculum.
And then my latest book iscalled the Build a Bigger Life
(13:59):
Manifesto, and this has sort ofbeen my life's work over the
last five years of teachingpeople how to build a bigger
life, not a bigger lifestyle.
And a bigger life for me is theidea of time with family and
travel and getting to practiceyour guitar or your piano just
(14:19):
because you want to.
You know, having free time todo what you want, as opposed to
having to work all the time topay for the stuff you have.
And the book itself was kind ofa labor of love, and I finished
it in Sorrento, italy, in 2019.
So it's got a lot of greatmemories just in the completion
(14:40):
of it.
Speaker 1 (14:43):
That's really good.
I think it's kind of I can seelike the maturity level of the
books, coming from book numberone to two to three, and I think
it's covering the differentdimensions of what can you do
the best in life, including themoney savings idea.
(15:03):
You're not just saying like,hey, these are the principles
just for students, but alsosaying like, look at the life,
as you can save 100, you knowyou can save $1,000.
It's not that hard.
But also what is veryinteresting is, I think, your
third book, where you mentionedthat having a better life and
(15:26):
how to save more money out ofthe student loans what most of
the parents would be interestedwho are listening to the podcast
.
So let's let a bit dig into.
Starting with, what are thecommon myths or mistakes that
parents do in terms of planningfor their, for the students,
(15:50):
education and in terms ofplanning for the student loan.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
I think the most, the one that stands out the most
for me, hema, is not being incommunication with your student
about who actually is paying forschool or how it's being paid
for.
And you know, we could betalking to any level of
entrepreneur today, right, thesecould be folks just getting
started or wanting to startentrepreneurs, we might call
(16:18):
them, and those who are supersuccessful and can stroke a
check for their kids, collegeand everywhere in between.
The challenge that I saw indoing the documentary on student
loan debt and the amount ofwork that I did on campuses was
that I would meet students allthe time that when I asked them
either how much will you have instudent loan debt or how is
(16:40):
college being paid for, they'dbe like I have no idea.
My parents just did it, so theydidn't know how much they were
borrowing.
So if that was the case, maybetheir parents filled out the
FAFSA and approved the financialaid package.
Or if they were in the knowabout the financial aid package,
but it'd been three years orfour years, they had no idea how
(17:04):
much the loan had grown to interms of interest and expense,
and I think, from a parentalperspective, one of the worst
things we can do for our kids isnot clue them into what they're
actually getting themselvesinto, because there were also a
number of students that said Idon't know, my parents are
paying for it.
And then when they graduated,their parents are like surprise,
(17:26):
here's your parent plus payment, right?
Or here's your Stafford loanpayment.
And the kids were caught offguard.
They thought their parents werepaying for it.
So in our household, one of thestrategies that we implemented
that your listeners mightappreciate is at the dinner
table from the time my kids werepreteen.
I would say hey guys, what doyou think it costs to go to USC?
(17:48):
Hey, what do you think it costsfor Purdue?
What do you think it costs togo to Notre Dame?
What do you think Harvard costs?
And the kids would guess and Iwould look it up or we'd use
Alexa or whatever to find outwhat total cost of attendance
was.
But I wanted my kids tounderstand what college costs
(18:09):
were before they ever startedthinking through well, how would
we ever pay for that?
Because it's hard for a 14, 15,16 year old kid to fathom what
$50,000 a year looks like,particularly borrowed over four
years.
That might become 200 or 220 bythe time interest is calculated
.
So I think the biggest pitfallto avoid is not sharing more
(18:37):
with your kids about how thatprocess is gonna unfold.
Speaker 1 (18:43):
I think that is, I think, the first and important
step communication with thestudents so that they have an
idea what they would be goingthrough.
It's not something that iscoming for free or coming easily
, but there is a lot of amountof work from the parent side,
(19:03):
but also, potentially, if youdidn't plan properly, from the
student side too, from the kidsside, once they graduated.
Let's talk about yourdocumentary, which is very, very
interesting, but before hoppinginto the documentary, let's
talk about the book.
You said your first book havebeen distributed in high schools
(19:26):
and colleges, or, okay, is itpart of your strategy, part of
your thinking, to say that, hey,you know what.
This book really needs to go inthe hands of the high schoolers
, really needs to go in thehands of the college students.
They really need to know thatother side of the table.
Was that something your idea?
Speaker 2 (19:48):
It was, you know, my first book.
I probably didn't have thatmuch forethought, you know it
was sort of like we have a storyto tell.
Let's tell it by the third book, the Master of Money for
Students.
I had been on college campusesfor probably a decade and I had
heard so many questions and youknow, questions from students
(20:10):
but also then the feedback I wasgetting or answers I was
getting from my questions tothem.
You know, just as an example,hema, many students.
They didn't know the differencebetween a 1099 job and a W2 job
.
And it may just be semantics,it may just be the language
you're using.
They didn't understand.
But I wanted that book toillustrate these are 1099 type
(20:33):
careers, these are W2 typecareers.
This is how you invest money.
This is the difference betweena Roth IRA, a SEP IRA, a 401K.
I wanted them to know thatbecause it felt like the
vocabulary that society is usingwhen they graduate, maybe
unbeknownst to them when theygraduate.
So there were a lot of recentgrads who would say, yeah, in my
(20:58):
first week on the job theyasked me about a 401K but I
declined it because I didn'twant any money taken out of my
paycheck and the book really wasintended to help educate
students about the power of a401k and articulate why they
should be starting early andbuilding the right habits from a
young age and things like that.
(21:18):
So I think it would be great tosay that I had this idea, you
know, longstanding plan.
But I will say that I havestudents who've said I got your
green book in high school, I gotthe black book in college, we
watched your TED Talk in my highschool financial literacy class
and we watched your documentaryin, you know, in my junior
(21:40):
college class or my collegeclass.
I literally have had people sayyes, you've been along for
almost every step of the way andfor me, like there's no greater
satisfaction than knowingsomething I put into the world
some time ago is still touchingpeople you know, here or there.
And, candidly, I like goinginto half price books every now
(22:00):
and again and seeing if one ofmy books is on the shelf.
But then I see that I inscribethis to somebody.
And who do I need to call outon this?
Because you know they sold mybook, but I don't blame them.
They got two or three bucks outof it, I suppose.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
But I think I'm pretty sure after hearing this
podcast, people would beshuffling through the
bookshelves and online to findyour books.
For sure, and to the audiencewe will definitely put all the
book names and the documentary,the names, the TED Talk, the
links and TED Talk what inspiredyou did?
(22:36):
Did you get like theoverwhelming requests from
people to give us a TED Talk,you know, so that we can sink in
all along that?
Or was the TED Talk also on theshred method or something
different?
Speaker 2 (22:49):
Yeah, it was something different.
And I wish that I could say itwas it was like all these
requests coming in to do oneReally a good friend of mine.
He said what's next for you?
And this was like back in 2013or 14.
And I said you know, I feellike I want to do a TED Talk.
(23:10):
I don't know what on yet, but Iknow I'm going to do a TED Talk
.
And he said well, how are yougoing to do it?
And I said I have no idea.
I'm going to leave it up to theuniverse.
I'm going to ask for divineguidance on it.
And this friend said why don'tyou put at the bottom of your
email under a double dashed lineit is my goal to one day grace
(23:32):
a TED stage.
If you could help me with that,I'd be forever in your debt.
And so I did that.
I put it as my signature lineand I sent out email after email
after email, and lo and behold,about eight to nine weeks later
, I got my first request for aTEDx event in Milwaukee,
wisconsin, and then, about fourweeks after that, I got another
(23:55):
almost identical request for anevent at the London Business
School in the UK and so ithappened.
And it happened sort of I wouldcall it the law of attraction
and action for me.
But the TED Talk that wentviral.
You know what really inspiredme about that was my work on
(24:17):
college campuses and all thesestudents that they didn't have a
clue what they were doing withmoney, and it occurred to me
that money just wasn't real.
They were in this environmentwhere they just swipe their
university ID or use athumbprint to get into the
lunchroom.
And then I came home one dayfrom a trip on a Friday,
saturday morning we're playing agame of Monopoly as a family
(24:40):
and I noticed that my kids werejust playing outside the rules
of the game.
They just wanted to roll thedice and move the pieces.
So the money was likeirrelevant to them and I went oh
the money's irrelevant.
I wonder, if the money were real, would it be relevant to them?
And so that inspired the talk,which is basically me playing a
cash game on Monopoly with mykids and the lessons we learned
(25:04):
from that.
You know, having 10 grand incold hard cash on the kitchen
table.
Speaker 1 (25:10):
That is.
You know, it's sometimes reallyinteresting and funny how we
get the motivation from thelittle cute parts of our life
and how it blossoms into a wholenew fantastic idea, in your
case, for the chat talk.
So again, thanks a lot, adam,for this interview, for
(25:34):
motivation and again, I wouldsay, for a big reality check for
a lot of parents who would behere in this podcast, who will
be there, for planning for thekids future and how
communication is important, howplanning is important, how
having an open communicationwith the kids about how their
(25:55):
future going to be, what theywill be getting the tuition paid
and so on.
Thanks for watching this.
Wrap up this podcast, but withthree main important key
takeaways, adam.
What would your suggestionwould be for fellow
(26:16):
entrepreneurs?
We are not talking about theshred method, we are not talking
about your SME, but from oneparent entrepreneur to another,
what would your suggestion be?
What would be the three keypoints they have to remember to
get them going and motivated andkeep on going?
Speaker 2 (26:36):
I think, on the children perspective and raising
kids.
I met this gentleman one timewho his one son had a full ride
scholarship.
Both kids had a full ridescholarship to undergrad and
then they both received fullride scholarships, one to law
school, one to med school.
(26:57):
I was having coffee with thisgentleman and I said how did you
do that?
How does a parent inspire theirkids to do full ride on both of
those?
He said Adam, your childrenwill do pretty much whatever you
expect of them.
Be very clear in yourexpectations.
I love that idea With my kids.
(27:21):
One of the things that I saidwas it is my expectation Now I
had a lot of them around howwell they'll do in school,
academically and things likethat.
One of the things I said was Iexpect that you'll have an MBA
before you ever go to college.
An MBA was a massive bankaccount.
I was teaching them habits ofsaving and investing from the
(27:43):
time they were young, but Iwanted them to realize that by
the time they went to collegethey could easily have $5,000 or
$10,000 sitting on thesidelines or in investments.
All of them have done it.
I think there is some truth toyour children will do what you
expect of them.
I would encourage entrepreneursout there as a second tidbit or
(28:05):
point is have conversations withyour kids about how your
business works Specifically.
You might even ask them what doyou wonder about in mom's
business or dad's business?
What are the things that maybeyour friends ask?
What do you wonder about howthis business works?
Because they're not always thatinquisitive, but they're
(28:26):
something they're wonderingabout.
How did we take that nicevacation two years ago?
What did that cost?
How did we do that?
Was that a business expense?
How did you make it a businessexpense?
Those kinds of things.
Ask them what they wonder,because we want to inspire
curiosity in our kids around ourbusiness.
Then, last but not least and itgoes hand in hand with the other
(28:48):
two is, I feel like, being veryclear with kids about what the
vision is is important, becauseI think too many parents go
through their daily life withoutsharing what the vision for
this month or this quarter orthis year looks like for the
kids.
I like to sit down with myfamily at the beginning of the
(29:11):
year and say, listen, my visionfor the year looks like this.
This is what our vacations willlook like.
This is what I want ourweekends to be.
What do you want it to looklike?
I'm doing it for two reasonsOne, to set the vision for them.
And number two, to let themknow it's okay to have their own
, and if I know what theirvision is, I'm going to be 100%
(29:31):
supportive of helping themachieve that.
So those are my three.
Speaker 1 (29:39):
I think, very, very well articulated, to be frank
with you.
And next key takeaway forparents who are planning for the
kids to go to college, to havetheir own mortgage to pay, but
they also want to start planningfor the student loan or for the
(30:03):
student tuition fee savings andso on, is 529k better or are
there other best options, likeRoth IRA or right now we see the
teen related IRA options too?
What would be?
How can they decide which isbest?
(30:23):
What are the metrics they needto consider?
Speaker 2 (30:25):
Yeah, so much of this depends on do you see your
child going on to a four yearschool and how much schooling
might they require?
I wish this was like a superhard and fast answer.
Hey, ma, I'm not sure it'sgoing to be.
I can tell you what.
I can tell you what we did andit worked.
(30:46):
You know, we funded a 529 planas much as we could, as early as
we could, knowing that the ruleof 72 is in play, right, which
is, whatever your interest ratethat you're making on that money
is divided by, divided into 72,will tell you how many years it
will take to double your money.
(31:06):
And we figured that if we hadput enough away that it would
double twice, we'd have enoughfor at least two, maybe three
years of college.
And the assumption was that ourkids would probably get
scholarships, just givenacademically, how they'd done
and what we were really drivinghome for them was there's so
(31:27):
much free money for school.
It's going to be a priority foryou to go find it and we'll
help you, but you're going tofind free money for school.
And so you know, using thatplan, we used 529 plan money to
help fund the majority of theircollege career, and I believe
I'm going to knock on wood here,but I believe all three of them
(31:48):
will finish with no studentloans whatsoever and my
daughter's applying for amaster's program where she'll
get paid to go.
So I hope the other two dosomething similar.
We'll see, but I feel likewe've set them up, you know,
from a financial mindsetperspective and from a financial
perspective, to help them getthrough school with a limited
(32:11):
amount of stress.
Speaker 1 (32:12):
Yeah, and I think that's very, very important for
kids to know that there is,there are options for you to get
paid, for you to go to collegeand you need to find a way, you
need to be the best, in whateverway you can, to match that
expectations of the college.
And I think it's kind of likepitching your startup idea to
(32:38):
the investors.
I would say it in that way,saying like why you are unique
compared to the other 500applicants that are trying to
apply for the scholarships.
And last equation for youngentrepreneurs right, they might
(32:59):
be a parent of a baby or atoddler, or who want to start
their journey from a corporatenine to five job to hopping in,
or they might want to thinkabout a side hustle to start
with and then eventually go down.
What do you think is a veryimportant point?
(33:21):
The starting phase ofentrepreneurs have to learn or
have to keep it in mind whenthey start the journey.
Speaker 2 (33:35):
What comes to mind for me.
My answer to that question is Ithink that if it is one unit of
a couple, that they need to be100% on board with each other,
that this is what they're goingafter.
And that might mean, if thefemale is the entrepreneur and
(33:56):
the other partner is the spouse,okay with either having a job
or being stay at home, thatthere is time dedicated to build
that business and that they'resupportive of that time.
Because what I find in coupleswhere one is an entrepreneur
maybe they're raising kidstogether is that the
(34:16):
entrepreneur gets pulled awayfrom their entrepreneurial
duties into parenting and right,wrong or indifferent, it
happens.
but it's really important forone spouse to really protect the
time for that entrepreneur todevote time and energy and
attention to the business,because the level of focus and
the level of focus, time andeffort and energy that you put
(34:39):
into your business willtranslate to how much traction
and growth you have in thebusiness in short order, whereas
if it's very distracted, it'sgoing to take you a lot longer
and maybe you lose steam.
So I find that partners who arealigned on the vision, on the
commitment, on the expectations,they can go really far together
(35:01):
.
Speaker 1 (35:02):
Yeah, I do remember when I was trying to get the
tech startup and I want to quitmy corporate job to start my
tech startup, me and my husbandhad around like six months of
continuous discussion, or it'slike, are we sure, if I go this
(35:24):
way, then this is how our familylife would be, this is how our
finances would be, and it's noteasy.
It's not at all easy for parentswho want to even start the side
hustle or even go through theparent entrepreneurship journey.
And I mean a big kudos to allthe parents and entrepreneurs
who are there who are evenstarting as a side hustle,
(35:47):
because it's hard.
It's hard, yeah, because you'renot single.
You have your duties as aspouse, you have your duties as
a partner, you have your dutiesas a parent, and it's something
that is not easily ignoredbecause it's going to impact the
(36:07):
family overall.
So, thanks again, adam andeverybody.
Adam, carol, again, the authorof four books, the inventor of
thread method and parententrepreneur by himself.
So thank you, adam, once againfor your amazing episode and eye
(36:28):
opening facts around the shredmethod, the student loans and
mainly about the parententrepreneurship journey.
Speaker 2 (36:37):
Love it, Thank you.
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (36:40):
Thank you.
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