THE Cambridge Connection - Episode 49

Yeah, absolutely. So I want to kind of quickly summarize and break down for our listeners what the announcement was. So if you make less than $125,000, or you’re a couple that makes less than $250,000, the forgiveness options off of the balance of your loan, it is not a check, it is not stimulus, people are not getting that money in the mail, it’s going to come off of their balance that they owe. So it’s either $10,000 or $20,000 for people that had Pell Grants and those types of loans. So the details still are coming out on how people will qualify for it.

It’s my understanding that there’s going to be an application process, which already alarms me. How do they not know every account holder that has a federal loan, they can’t just apply the money to the loan balance, right? Well, you know, it’s funny you should bring that up, because I thought I did read that. I was looking into something and they were saying that there’s no need to contact anyone just yet. Of course, because they still haven’t given the details.

So it seems like Marty Lynch, Director of Education, put out some information and I think he’s going to continue to update on social media and different areas about these changes or actual finite details that come with this program. But the concern for me is obviously if people have to apply, I think the number I saw was 8 million people or so will not have to apply and the rest of the 45 million will need to put some form of application in. Unfortunately, you know it and I know it, it’s just like the waiver process that’s in place until Halloween. People are going to miss the boat, they’re not going to apply. And again, we’ll see where this all goes.

I really hope there’s different opinions out there. People are mad if they refinance their loans with a private lender, they’re not getting the money. If they use their equity in their home to do it, they’re not getting the money. People that paid off their loans in full aren’t getting the money, so there’s a lot of energy in this conversation about student loans again and again and again. And this seems like a small fix in my opinion and I’ve posted this on Twitter, I’ve asked Senator Warren, didn’t get an answer, at Gordon No Cares on Twitter.

How are we fixing the problem? This is a Band-Aid again, but where is any information about how they’re going to fix the cost of college and that an 18-year-old is making a huge, huge bill investment debt that they don’t even understand what it feels like to pay when you get out of college and you need to have a roof over your head, have an automobile for transportation to get to work, utilities, groceries, everything costs more. Financial education, that’s what it comes down to. And you know, Gordon, I was actually reading 13 states right now are going to incorporate tax on the student loan forgiveness, anywhere from $500 to $1,000. So that’s something that, you know, I don’t remember hearing about.

And then again, things that you have to look into because if you’re forgiven and now you owe the tax and you don’t know you owe the tax, now we’re looking at penalties and... All the above, right? So this is the life that we’re in and giving advice here. Things are constantly being unpacked and unfolding. org with your questions and we can either get an answer to you via email or have a certified counselor reach out to you.

Break and show promotion

So Tina, I could keep going here and I think we have our special guest joining us in the next conversation. So I think we’ll take a quick break and we’ll talk about this in more future shows because again, more and more information will be coming back. This is Gordon Oliver with The Cambridge Connection. We’ll be right back. Are the rise in prices for gas and other expenses crushing your budget?

Cambridge’s typical clients save $140 per month while paying down their credit card debt at much lower interest rates. Call 1-800-CAMBRIDGE. Welcome back everyone to The Cambridge Connection. I’m your host here with my co-pilot, thankfully. She’s been obviously MIA for a little while, so so glad to have you back in the chair.

Guest introduction and background story

So nice to be back. And obviously we talked about the new student loan announcement and we’ve been talking about the economy and it’s my pleasure and my honor to introduce our special guest, Brent Hines who’s the Chief Development Officer of the Foundation for Financial Wellness. Welcome Brent. Great to be here. Thanks for having me.

Appreciate it. Listen, there’s no more important times. This show is about financial wisdom, financial wellness, financial empowerment, and obviously no better time to be talking about people’s financial status in the economic times that we’re in. So before we get into that, could you please tell our listeners, family and friends about your career and what got you to where you are today? Yeah, happy to.

The short, short version, Gordon, is I grew up a poor kid, single mom, had a terrible relationship with money, that’s terminology we use today, not terminology we used back then, worked my way through college, first person in our family to go, kind of had that enormous proverbial chip on my shoulder, going to prove the world wrong, get mom out of the bouncing from apartment to apartment, living paycheck to paycheck kind of lifestyle, socioeconomically related. And went into the world of financial advising. So today I half joke that I’m a recovering financial advisor, had a lot of success right out of the gate doing that, which was fortunate. Learned the hard way that earning more income almost always adds to the problem, it doesn’t solve the problem. So I had some learning to do as a young man as to what it is that I really wanted, money and wealth and all things related to debt and credit, that there’s so much more.

And just what I had taken from the business school with a degree in finance, there was this human element. And I would always say, man, I really should have majored in psychology and minored in finance just to be as much help as possible to people who we were working with. So the financial services industry really is kind of a broke model, at least the old way of doing it, in my opinion, because as I look back and I think about the work that I was doing back in that former life, told someone last week that I looked up one morning and realized I managed money for unappreciative, rich, white guys. Nope. This is not fulfilling.

This is not the dream. And I’m answering for a market that I can’t control. So what are we doing here? So I had this big life event. Our life melted down personally, professionally.

It was scary. I had two young kids at home and my wife, Amy. And I had to start over in 08 as the market’s melting down. So hopefully that’s very relatable to a lot of people out there who were adulting in 2008 and beyond. And we ended up creating, long story made, very, very short, the Foundation for Financial Wellness.

Behavioral economics and money mindset

Today we’re a 501c3, an educational nonprofit. And we are truly built on a wellness chassis. And I’m sure we’ll talk about that today. But we mean both words, financial and wellness. That came to be when we were doing educational workshops, like financial literacy movement around 2010.

We were fortunate enough that I seemed to be able to talk my way into parties I wasn’t invited to. And I talked our way into NASA, of all places, Johnson Space Center. The only reason we got in was because at the time, the brand new Obama administration had just announced that they were going to mothball the space shuttle program, if you can kind of think back to those days. And there was going to be a lot of layoffs. Like they were expecting 5,000 to 7,000 layoffs in the 18-month window.

So I think from an HR and a liability standpoint, and stress, and awful culture on site. So I was just the right guy at the right time, right message. They let me come in. We’ve always taught from a behavioral economics standpoint. That is total geekdom to most everybody who is emotionally healthy.

But we love it. And I just geek out on that intersection of psychology and money. Why do we do the things we do as individuals, as families, as communities, as a nation? Why do we do the things we do with money? It’s not because of a lack of know-how or a lack of access to the information.

We literally have everything we need to know in the palm of our hand today. So why are we misbehaving so often? Why are we misbehaving just as a way of life? Yeah, and you brought up the wisdom aspect of this, right? And we’ve said before on this show that you don’t become a master in martial arts until you go through the process of learning to be able to conduct yourself with the greatest, sharpest skills.

And the financial literacy term is so over-abused that that’s what the issue is. We’re not short of information. And I completely agree with you that mentality and behavior have so much to do with the relationship with money. That’s our sermon, Gordon-like. We preach it, preach it, preach it everywhere we go.

And it’s so interesting. It was because when we were at NASA, we learned the power of behavior change and the science of it. Coincidentally, because we met the lady who ran the wellness program there, we weren’t talking behavior change. Well, behavioral economics, we were kind of scratching the surface. But when we met a lady by the name of Karen Myers, she’s literally a rocket scientist at NASA, has degrees in things I can’t pronounce.

She hosted a class through the wellness program. And we taught our behavioral economics course. And the point of me telling you this is because our model is, I don’t know if you’re familiar with the be, do, have methodology. You could look at it linear, left, right. You could look at it like in a circular, like a recycled circuit.

Some people put it on a triangle, three corners. But it’s be, do, and have. And most everything finance related or financial literacy related goes straight to the have. I want to have the know-how, the X’s and O’s, the nuts and bolts. We can talk about mutual fund stocks, annuities, life insurance.

We can talk about all that stuff. But if we don’t have the prior two pieces in place, we really don’t have a foundation to launch from. So we take a step back and go, hey, be, do, have. Let’s go to the doing. Those are the behaviors.

And we say that there’s really three behavior types. There’s good behavior, bad behavior, and then probably the most dangerous is the missing behaviors. Because when there are missing behaviors, it’s just a natural law of humanity. There is a default. It’s built, like, money is in motion whether you like it or not.

Things are happening. There is a default option if you’re not being proactive. And if we want to understand those behaviors, we’ve got to take the additional step back and go to the be, a be, do, have, that how we’re being, how we show up, how we think, our relationship with money, that all things finance. So many of those beliefs, the psychologists would call them scripts or tapes or records for anyone under 30, like in, think in P4. Those are given to us when we’re little.

Like, our authoritative figures mold and shape our belief about money. Is it of abundance? Is it scarce? Is it for blessing others? Is it for spending?

Is there enough at the end of the month? Is it for hoarding? Like, there’s so many different variations of how we think about and believe, beliefs we have about money that directly impact our behaviors. It’s like a one-to-one correlation, nearly. And that’s what drives our outcomes, our haves.

Money amongst other things, right? That’s right. Be, do, have applies to nearly everything in life. All right, listen, we’re up against a hard break. I would like to hold you over, if you don’t mind, so you can break down the foundation, what it does, and some advice for consumers, how to contact you, et cetera.

Podcast promotion and light banter

So we’re gonna take a quick break. We’ll be right back. This is Gordon Oliver with The Cambridge Connection. Well, Tina Marie, here we are, already in our mid-30s. Have you checked your license lately?

You’re a far cry from being in your mid-30s. No, no, not me. Our show, The Cambridge Connection. We’re already more than halfway through our first year of great guests and need-to-know topics. Oh, I thought you were talking about your age.

Well, that would take a lot longer than we have in this message, but what only takes a moment to share is that if you miss any of our shows on Saturdays on WHMP, don’t worry. com, click on podcasts, and all of our shows are listed there. Plus, listeners can find us on all the podcast sites where they listen to their favorite podcast. Well, when I get home, I’m gonna listen to my favorite episode. And what’s that?

Foundation for financial wellness services

You know, the one with me in it. Ha! Welcome back, everyone. This is The Cambridge Connection. I’m your host, Gordon Oliver, here with my long-missed co-pilot, Tina Marie, and our special guest, Brent Hines.

He’s the Chief Development Officer for the Foundation for Financial Wellness and in our economic times, no more important of a conversation than we are having. Brent, thank you for joining the show. Now, in the Foundation for Financial Wellness, can you give some advice on the things that you do that people could use your services for? Well, I would say that almost the entire financial industry is using the term financial wellness, and I would say 95% of them don’t mean it or don’t know what it means. And I don’t mean to take shots at the entire industry, but.

Break it down for us. So, it needs to be comprehensive. It needs to be inclusive. It must meet everyone where they’re at. Like, these are our core beliefs.

So, whether you’re just starting out or whether maybe you’re not starting out, but you’ve dug a hole here or you’ve been putting a hole. Or maybe you’re nearing retirement or maybe you’re in retirement and you’re thinking about what kind of legacy do I want to leave. All of those demographics have different needs and plenty of them, by the way, for financial wellness. If I know what financial wellness in our world is a combination of education, but it also needs to include resources, counseling, one-on-one counseling, technology, like a trusted referral base when you do need someone to help you implement on any of these topics. It can’t just be sitting in front of a DVD or a streaming service and listening to some blowhard know-it-all shame you.

It just can’t be that. The foundation goes out to the world at this point and we typically either go through employers, some kind of organization, sometimes associations, and we become like a member benefit or an employee benefit, but we’re also available to individuals who want to come check us out as well. They can come inside of our community. That was very intentional. COVID taught us that.

Crystal clear, we’re wired for community and we believe most others are as well. We created a membership model that has self-paced, pre-recorded all the resources, but also has live stream and then some in-person events. There’s a lot of energy and, again, interaction with one another and answering each other’s questions and, hey, what did you think about this? Does somebody have a good resource for that? We’ve created this ecosystem that people are accessing either through their employer or an association or they can come to us directly.

However they come to us, we want them all to have the same experience. It’s non-solicitous, it’s absolutely unbiased, and it’s completely comprehensive on all of the topics regardless of age or stage. When somebody comes to you and you said all different types of people and financial goals, where does it start? We have developed, I’m glad you asked, we’ve developed a personal financial assessment. It’s not good, it’s not bad, think of it as a money x-ray.

It just is. You come in and you get a baseline. Not everyone’s the same. It’s not like you’re looking, there’s no scoring, it’s just telling you where you’re at on your financial wellness journey on any of these given topics from cradle to grave, literally, and recommended paths of education and actions to take. Where we look up and find ourselves as a nation today, you guys at Cambridge are well aware of this, people are hurting right now and there doesn’t seem to be light at the end of the tunnel at this moment.

Workplace financial stress and employers

Finding somewhere where they can go, like a trusted resource, somebody to lean on, literally sometimes a shoulder to cry on, what’s going on, what have I done, how do I get out of it, how do I keep myself and all my family safe? The personal financial assessment, when you come into our ecosystem, it will give that baseline measurement. Then if you choose to take advantage of our counseling, which Cambridge does as well, that counselor has a starting point with you, you can dive right into, okay, let’s start getting you well. You brought up the shame part of this, and I think part of the sponsor of the show is Cambridge Credit Counseling, and they work too for their counseling services to get into employee benefits because, and I saw a headline in Fortune that low-wage employees report high levels of financial stress, and to your point, if there’s shame there, they’re probably not talking to HR about it. There’s no benefit that the employer has to help with it, so you’ve got an employee kind of stuck at work, not happy, kind of miserable.

It probably affects morale, productivity, quality of product. The mental aspect that I love that you get into is all about solving not just the financial piece but the mental approach or feeling that people have dealing with the relationship of money. That’s exactly right. I’m fortunate I get invited to come give keynote addresses oftentimes, whether it be in the wellness industry or the financial industry or sometimes just the corporate industry of how can we best serve our people, and then how can we also increase productivity, increase employee engagement, less in turnover, lower health costs. S.

state that financial matters is their number one cause of stress. It’s the elephant in the room, and employees are admitting it’s a distraction at work. A little company, consulting company called Mercer, insert sarcasm here, they came out with a report recently that said 13 hours a month are lost to employees being unproductive due to financial concerns. I would think that was higher. Yeah.

Isn’t that crazy? It’s extraordinary, for sure. But this is... Do the math. This is why, again, having you on, we can’t possibly cover everything on this show.

So of course, I would love to have you back, because there’s just so much information that we can provide. And again, it’s not a document. It’s not a go create your budget, because we know, obviously, those things take work and people... That’s not the only answer. You’ve got to look at how you approach money to your point, how we’ve been indoctrinated on how we feel about it.

So there’s so much to talk about. And before I let you go, I’d like to give you the opportunity to let our listeners, family and friends know how they can get involved, how they can find you, how they can call with questions or understanding about the services you offer. Yeah, thank you. If we’re talking about you, come to the website. org.

If you’re thinking about your organization or your co-workers, or maybe a spouse or other family member, think about introducing the concept of financial wellness and the shameless plug, the Foundation for Financial Wellness, mention it to your employer. We literally have, Gordon, a no-cost, free option for individuals and or employers to start with. It’s our core membership. It brings a ton of value. Of course, we have premium level tiers as well, but you don’t have to go there.

You could come in and get started at literally no cost. The assessment I mentioned is included in there. Your organizations that you’re a member of, your church, your charity, we have taught in anywhere where people congregate, this is a topic of interest. Oftentimes, it’s the number one requested topic when employees are asked, hey, what do you want more advice, help or guidance with? Come check us out at the website.

Mention it to your employer. Mention it to your church. We can’t talk about this enough right now. Gordon, you guys are in the same dugout with us. You guys are doing great, great work.

We appreciate our relationship with you and you having us on the show today too. Again, people need us more than ever to have these dialogues, to push people in the direction of taking action. We’d love to have you back on the show again to talk more about this because you can’t do it enough, especially in hard times when the cost of everything is rising and people are getting in more and more trouble. Again, so grateful to have you on the show and I’ll get in touch with you so we can get you back on in the near future. Thank you, Gordon.

All right, we’re going to take a quick break. This is Gordon Oliver with The Cambridge Connection. We’ll be right back. From the mind of TEDx presenter, former top financial advisor and international speaker Brent Hines, the Foundation for Financial Wellness is the gold standard in the financial wellness industry, recognized by the National Wellness Institute and NASA. The foundation is a nonprofit.

Award-winning approach in adult learning theory and positive behavior change, our stance is clear. When we say financial wellness, we mean both words. org. org. Welcome back, everyone, to The Cambridge Connection, here with my absent co-host for a while, Tina Marie.

Closing recap and final thoughts

Tina, again, I think the guests on the program just really solidify what this show is all about. Absolutely, I mean, he touched on it. The behavior changes that consumers might not even realize they need to make to just simply educate themselves and put them in a better financial position. Yep, and on a quick side note, I always heard on programs when they said, you know, off mic, right? You have things that you’re passionate about, and our producer, drinking liquid death, had some things to say about what we’re talking about, because there’s a culture out there that needs to shift.

There’s no question about it. Especially in the employment realm, the cultures need to shift at this point. The excuse now that we can’t get employees, there’s reasons behind that, needs to be looked into. Right, and Leah was right on point when she had mentioned, you know, you make the employees happy, you’re gonna get more productivity out of them. However, you know, there’s also guidelines and rules, so.

And again, this is why it has to be dialogue to find common ground. Sure. Because through the pandemic, many businesses went out of business. So you’ve got the business owner’s perspective, or the shareholder’s perspective, or the board of directors’ perspective to run the business. And then you got the people doing the work.

Without them, you don’t do any work. You’re not running the business, right? And let’s, you know, obviously the great resignation, and which ironically enough, I was just listening to the other day, they were saying that a lot of these employees that did resign during COVID, actually are regretting it at this point. You know, the grass isn’t always greener on the other side, but it’s just important to use communication, you know, communicate with your employer, employers communicate with your employees, and it can go a long way. It really can.

Many of the mistakes that I’ve made in my life have been emotional, triggered, not calculated. And this is one of those things that you really need to know what you’re doing and have a plan of attack. And I like that Brent brought up the mental aspect of this, right? So we all have programming, that there are techniques and things that you can do to not erase it, but reprogram how you think. And the money relationship, it’s one that’s ever changing, and you just have to put some time and work there.

Always learning. It’s not just about the money comes in and it goes out. It’s learning how to have that relationship and how to deal with it. And with the changes in the financial industry, there’s always more to learn. Always.

Always. And the guests, by the way, we’re coming up on our one year anniversary. I’m excited. And the list of guests have been incredible up to this one year anniversary. And we’re gonna keep bringing some of the same guests on to talk about the economic culture that we’re in and together do our job to really get the best information we can get out for our listeners.

I’m proud of what we’ve done here. That’s what we’re here for. You’ve been a tremendous friend and asset in getting this program to where it is. I’ve missed you so much, Gordon. I know, I’m gonna start crying soon, but I’m gonna try to get out of the show before I do.

All right, so obviously we talked about the student loan issue, so I brought a quote because this is something that I am on. We’ve gotta fix the problem. We can’t just bandaid it with taxpayers’ money and not have it be fixed. By making college unaffordable and student loans unbearable, we risk deterring our best and brightest from pursuing higher education and securing a good paying job. Mark Pocan.

Well, again, it’s time to close the show. A huge thank you to our producers, Leah and Lisa, for everything they do to help us produce and pull off this show. As mentioned, we have great experts on the horizon and we prove that over time. com, click on Podcasts, and you can listen to any of the previous shows or you can go to places like Spotify where you listen to your favorite podcasts. org or feel free to call.