Paying it Forward - Helping the next generation

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DawgMan

Full time employment: Posting here.
Joined
Oct 22, 2015
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I have been moving from semi-retirement to now basically fully retired over the last 2 1/2 years, which has been good for me. Having just turned 58, I feel like I am in a good place relative to being at peace with my former A driven/competitive work personality and also filling my hobbies and travel buckets, however, I continue to struggle with finding some ways/organizations/structures in which I can keep the mind stimulated, match my passions, and make a little difference in the world. Like many folks on this forum, I enjoy finance and the various strategies in the pursuit of FI. What I have learned over the years from talking with many of my peers is very few people are either interested in this stuff or have learned the basics and most just rely on what their "guy" tells them to do as it relates to retirement/FI. I actually dig this stuff and find it comes pretty easy to me... like many here on this board. In a perfect world, I would like to carve out some of my time to help young adults/families and recent college grads understand this stuff so they too can hopefully have opportunities FI affords, especially at a younger age. I have spent some time exploring ideas on line and at my church, but nothing yet has hit the strike zone.

For those of you that might have pursued something like this, what structures/organizations did you choose (i.e. blogs, podcasts, church, civic, other)? My only sensitivity is not over volunteering where it starts to feel like a full time job. Ideas? Experiences?
 
I think you are correct in observing that most here were interested in and learned about finances and investing. But I think that is a rare trait; most people just do what "their guy" tells them because they have no interest in learning about finances on their own and/or little desire to make the sacrifices necessary to retire early. So I'm not sure that there are a lot of volunteer opportunities to teach willing students about this stuff.
 
I too am open to hearing what's out there that fits this description, because I looked but failed to find something that's a match. I was a financial advisor for six years and LOVE talking about money/investing and how it relates to life. The closest thing I found was teaching classes through Dave Ramsey but you had to pay for the training and it felt like they were trying too hard to sell -me- on the idea.
 
No experience in this, but ideas--how about checking in with local high schools, community colleges, or city parks/recreation facilities for offering "free" finance seminars--balancing checkbooks, figuring out a budget, savings, and moving into investment/retirement info depending on the audience.
Something to be offered at your choice for time involvement and content adjusted based on attendees ages/stages in life.
 
The youngsters of this world essentially have no idea what personal finance is about. It ought to be something that's required curriculum in todays' schools.

But come to think about it, we never had any university level courses in personal finance when I went thru Business School. Maybe with more education, so many wouldn't have run up huge student loans living in apartments, eating out and going on Spring Breaks.

I can see where young people need basic training in personal finance--and the basics on how to live their lives. That subject goes beyond just finances and might be best handled thru churches. Young people need to know about hanging out with the right people, paying bills on time, staying out of auto collisions, keeping clean drivers' licenses, keeping high FICO scores to keep down insurance premiums and generally making life a little easier down the line.

My daughter didn't live with us much past h.s., and she's made every mistake in the book including 10+ years of couch surfing. She finally has a job, but has had her wages garnished. And she's totaled out 3 of my cars--and spent 2+ years on ankle express. And now we like so many others are raising her 10 year old daughter permanently--giving up our retired years. But that's another story.
 
You can usually find a local church or school that sponsors adult education self-help workshops. Maybe the board of education can suggest something.

Essentially you need to design a course so that it is repeatable. Others here have done that and would probably share their outline and materials.
 
Bamaman said:
...

But come to think about it, we never had any university level courses in personal finance when I went thru Business School. Maybe with more education, so many wouldn't have run up huge student loans living in apartments, eating out and going on Spring Breaks...
Click to expand...
When I was young, I held to the Socratic belief that if people knew what the "good" was, then they would do that. No one would deliberately do evil, so the problem was just lack of knowledge. With better education, people would improve. Now, I know better; plenty of people know exactly what they need to do, they just won't do it.
 
I did develop and gave a personal finance course at my church. I titled it "$mart Money" subtitled "Personal Finance Education for Life", with a fat piggy bank on the front page; which I thought was kind of a way to solicit interest and infer the purpose for the course. It was my way of giving back something. It went OK, but ultimately people will either be interested or not in personal finance and saving. It can be a broad subject as well, depending on how deep and what subjects you get into. My main points were emphasizing the two simple rules of LBYM and Pay Yourself First. The rest was supporting info on how to make that savings work. Covered some money saving points, showed compound interest, investing principles, and more financial information. Whether anyone benefited I am not sure, as it was only couple years ago. Then Covid hit and have not done it again, although it has been discussed. Most of the people in my class were not younger, but middle aged range. It was done in eight 1 hour class sessions. However I think it would be better to be four sessions of about 1.5 hours each. Probably the most benefit was people asking questions and getting class participation instead of me just lecturing on a topic.

Unfortunately most people have not had any real personal finance education. Young people starting out can benefit the most, but seem to be the hardest ones to attend or admit they can use help.
 
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I highly recommend volunteering as a mentor at a local university. Once you establish yourself, you might be offered the opportunity to present a personal finance workshop to the students. Even if that doesn’t happen, the opportunity to make a difference by guiding individual students not only on financial issues but also on career decisions, interviewing skills, resume preparation, etc. is very rewarding. This can be done on your own time.
 
I worked for 2 large corporations. They both offered pre-retirement classes.

I signed up for the first time at age 32 and everyone else in the class was about 2 years from "normal" retirement. The instructor complimented me, and said you have enough time ahead of you to make changes, if needed, whereas these other students will only have a choice of how to take their pension (with or without survivor benefits, etc.) and when to take SS.

Since covid caused such a shake-up in our economy, perhaps consider pitching to folks with side-gigs, gig jobs, WFH situations, etc?

I always looked though the adult education brochures issued by my community school system, the local community college, etc. and never saw any financial literacy-type classes.

Occasionally, I'd see something being pitched by a financial planner, which I studiously avoided as I didn't need to be "sold" on their services. ;)

At work, I as always amazed at how so many people proudly said they turned everything financial over to "their guy" to handle. They had zero interest in finances themselves. :(

omni
 
When I first retired I volunteered 2 days per week at an adult literacy center in inner-city Baltimore as a tutor. Seeing how the mainly poor clientele was getting ripped off in so many ways, I offered to develop and present a very basic “Money 101” course. I located a free curriculum - I think it was called “Money Smart” - put together by the FDIC that was at about the right level of simplicity. The NCUA had a virtually identical curriculum with an emphasis on credit unions vs. banks and I opted to use that since banks were one source of the rip-offs I wanted to teach them about. I also thought this course would help to supplement the basic math we were teaching there.

Well….in spite of a big “marketing” effort, nobody signed up. Two guys seemed moderately interested but I quickly learned that their only interest was in using me as a sounding board for the various fast-buck schemes they came up with every week. But, zero interest in learning the principles of sound personal financial management. Discouraged, I stuck with tutoring reading and basic math.
 
As the above posts indicate, as much as we would like to share and "pay forward 'out knowledge, Many just are not seeking that, and are not interested. In fact, that is part of the reason many of us have found success in personal finance - we do (or attempt to do) what the majority of others are not doing, and that is what makes the difference.

Beyond my children I have paid it forward a bit with some of my nieces and nephews. Over the years about 6 of them have sought my opinion/guidance on personal finance matters. Most started by asking the question how come I am retired *and* not working, and I had replied along the lines of "a lot is due to things I started doing when I was your age", and that caught their interest. It started a conversation that has continued informally over the years. I remember sharing with them about I-Bonds back when the rate went above 3%, and they were shocked (they had *all confused I-Bonds with Series EE savings bonds), I know several said they were going to buy.

The biggest challenge I have found is trying to instill personal finance "patience" in them. You cannot teach that, one has to choose, and go against an increasing number of things that tells them that patience in life is not a virtue.
 
DawgMan said:
... For those of you that might have pursued something like this, what structures/organizations did you choose (i.e. blogs, podcasts, church, civic, other)? My only sensitivity is not over volunteering where it starts to feel like a full time job. Ideas? Experiences?
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I teach an Adult-Ed investing class for a couple of the local school districts. The class is 3x2hour sessions, format and length chosen by me. Each quarter they offer me some dates and I pick ones that work vs my other commitments. Truthfully, it was mostly a matter of volunteering; there was little vetting of qualifications. YMMV on this of course. One important thing I emphasize is that I am not offering the class in order to prospect clients; I am not selling anything. This has been marked as a plus in some of the student feedback, since many of the money- and legal-oriented classes are offered by people who are selling their services.

It's great fun.
 
Gumby said:
I think you are correct in observing that most here were interested in and learned about finances and investing. But I think that is a rare trait; most people just do what "their guy" tells them because they have no interest in learning about finances on their own and/or little desire to make the sacrifices necessary to retire early. So I'm not sure that there are a lot of volunteer opportunities to teach willing students about this stuff.
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Unfortunately I've had the same experience. Trying to help out employees in my work years, on my own time I volunteered to start an investment club using the NAIC template. I was encouraged when about a dozen people signed up (of 80 employees). After a few meetings it became obvious no one was willing to do any work - e.g. basic research on companies to invest in - all they had to do was find ValueLine at the library or online and fill out a one page NAIC form. They just wanted me to give them the guaranteed next 10-20 bagger stocks, one member said as much directly. And they expected the recommendations to do nothing but go up (rapidly) regardless of markets or the economy in general, ANY loss was unacceptable. Any loss would be MY FAULT :mad:.

Finding capable people who genuinely want to learn about solid DIY personal finance is needles in haystacks IME. The only way it might have a chance would be if they have to come to you, not vice versa. Anonymous online forums like this one are probably where the OP can help most.

I won't even make specific recommendations to friends and family, much less acquaintances or strangers. I will point people toward the best books and other resources I know of to learn from, but that's it. AFAIK none of those recommendations from my past ever panned out.

Like the OP I enjoy learning about and handling our personal finances - investing, budgets/spending, planning, taxes and everything else. Clearly there's something wrong with me... :crazy:
 
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If you get involved with organizations you could eventually become the Treasurer. Most folks do not have the interest or knowledge to do the job well.

I'm now Treasurer for two homeowner associations, and have developed extensive Excel workbooks to keep track of the financials. I have also started learning Excel VBA programming to automate some of the manual data entry I had been doing. I've wanted to learn VBA for several years and only recently have had the time to invest. The time spent learning VBA will pay for itself in time savings eventually.
 
Thanks all for the feedback. I may need to dig more at the civic level. I looked at the Ramsey program, but not my gig. I here ya on the realities often of "leading a horse to water, but can't make them drink". Perhaps I was just odd when I was younger and had an interest in FI. Unfortunately, my parents had limited experience so I read allot of self-help books and taught myself. Had a seasoned mentor who had "made it" offered to help me a s a young man, I think I would have jumped all over it. I think I would be more effective helping individuals or young couples on a one on one basis over a period of time as opposed to teaching a class to students. I seem to remember someone telling me about a national organization where retired professionals offer free consulting services based on their expertise??
 
omni550 said:
You may be thinking about SCORE https://www.score.org/

omni
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I was a SCORE mentor for about six years. Their efforts are oriented towards helping with small business development and growth, not investing or finance. Actually, a characteristic of almost all SCORE clients is that they have little or no money. The best of the mentors are typically those who have successfully run small businesses. The most important topic is almost always sales & marketing.

Not to diss SCORE for this, it's just what they do. They are heavily promoted and funded by the SBA. IIRC the SBA's definition of "small" is under $10M sales, but I never saw a client who was even close to that. Most were startups or pre-startups.

There are nonprofit credit counseling organizations around town that will be more money oriented but, again, clients have little or no money.
 
I mentored an immigrant family for over a year. My first lesson, stop spending unless there's a need. Especially for the kids, the mall was like candy bait. All the bells and whistles, new clothes, cute jewelry, shoes...junk fashion. Keeping up with other kids.
The mom did not know how to balance her checkbook. Nor how to understand how much she could save and still have a nice life.

Dave Ramsey has an interesting idea for people who do not know how to rein in their spending, and there are plenty of intelligent people out there who do not know how to stop spending. The budget. $xxx for utility and household expenses. $xxx for groceries, etc. I have family members, smart, successful who could not tell you how much they spend in a month. Not even close.

As far as investing. That part is easy. Put your money away, somewhere with interest, capital gains, or growth, and pretend it does not exist. A paycheck of $5000, pretend it's only $3000 and forget it. Manage your life with $3000.
 
I have a step child who is 30 years old and is being robbed by a Morgan Stanley advisor who is not a fiduciary. I won’t go into details but he has her in a mix of 14 etfs, stocks, and mutual funds for $50k and has underperformed the marker by a long shot. We are in the process of moving her out of Morgan Stanley and into a self directed accounts at Fidelity. She is fearful of managing her funds but now wants to step up.
I want to help educate her in personal finances and was interested in finding a good book.
Any suggestions for a Millennial?
 
Eastbayboy said:
I have a step child who is 30 years old and is being robbed by a Morgan Stanley advisor who is not a fiduciary. I won’t go into details but he has her in a mix of 14 etfs, stocks, and mutual funds for $50k and has underperformed the marker by a long shot. We are in the process of moving her out of Morgan Stanley and into a self directed accounts at Fidelity. She is fearful of managing her funds but now wants to step up.
I want to help educate her in personal finances and was interested in finding a good book.
Any suggestions for a Millennial?
Click to expand...

She could do a lot worse than this one:

https://www.amazon.com/Little-Book-...r_one_browse-bin:John+C.+Bogle&s=books&sr=1-1
 
Eastbayboy said:
I have a step child who is 30 years old and is being robbed by a Morgan Stanley advisor who is not a fiduciary. I won’t go into details but he has her in a mix of 14 etfs, stocks, and mutual funds for $50k and has underperformed the marker by a long shot. We are in the process of moving her out of Morgan Stanley and into a self directed accounts at Fidelity. She is fearful of managing her funds but now wants to step up.
I want to help educate her in personal finances and was interested in finding a good book.
Any suggestions for a Millennial?
Click to expand...

I pulled my elderly mother from the clutches of a Morgan Stanley "advisor".

He better never step out in front of my car. I get easily confused about which pedal I'm supposed to push.
 
On the pay it forward topic, my brother retired last year at 62.

He's experimenting with a side business mentoring "Failure to Launch" 20-somethings. Focus is on life skills, finding out what you want to do rather than what Mom & Dad want you to do, discipline, probably some finance tossed in.

More in the "life coach" category than anything else.

Like Midpack's "you're going to tell me what stocks to buy" issue, he had to make it very clear to the first customer's parents that he wasn't just going to whistle up a job for little Johnny. Not the point.

He said the demand is huge.

I give him a lot of credit and do think there is a legitimate need, but have cautioned him that he is entering an emotional and perhaps legal mine field. If Johnny doesn't have a job after 6 months of life coaching, I predict grumpiness.

Will be interesting to see how he does with it.
 
Final thought...

I do think a challenge with mentoring people on finance is that many of us have a skewed frame of reference on how interesting this is and also perhaps a natural aptitude with numbers.

Its sort of like asking an NFL wide receiver to coach me on fitness.

"OK, we're going to start with sprints, then work the core for an hour, then dead lift, then run pulling the sled down the field, then try to do a 40" vertical leaps with weights on our feet, then an ice bath. In the afternoon..."

I recently hired a real nice trainer. The first thing I told her was that I've had back, shoulder and elbow injuries. I can barely do 2 pull ups and I hate doing planks. Hate hate hate hate planks. I do like to watch Netflix on the elipitcal however. She's methodically built achievable work out plans for me. Pushes me to move forward but listens when I say "we're not doing that again at that weight." She and I get along great.

I recently helped one of my brothers with his finances after his wife passed away. He was 55 and it was a train wreck of debt, no savings, zero investing and the life plan hanging on a very sketchy pension.

I built what I thought was a very simple plan that started with "budget" and led to "retirement nest egg". He simply could not absorb it. I had to massively simplify it and do it in pieces. First he built a budget. Then we got out of debt. Then we built a cash cushion. Then we opened a brokerage account....

It took two years and I'm happy to say he's now debt free, has an emergency fund, and is plowing money into a 70/30 investment structure. But it made me realize how much I like this stuff and that I have trouble making it easy.
 
Eastbayboy said:
I have a step child who is 30 years old and is being robbed by a Morgan Stanley advisor who is not a fiduciary. I won’t go into details but he has her in a mix of 14 etfs, stocks, and mutual funds for $50k and has underperformed the marker by a long shot. We are in the process of moving her out of Morgan Stanley and into a self directed accounts at Fidelity. She is fearful of managing her funds but now wants to step up.
I want to help educate her in personal finances and was interested in finding a good book.
Any suggestions for a Millennial?
Click to expand...
[FONT=&quot]
"If You Can" by William Bernstein https://www.etf.com/docs/IfYouCan.pdf (free 16 page download)[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]
[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]"The Coffee House Investor" by Bill Schultheis https://www.coffeehouseinvestor.com/ (This is Bill's first book; read it before reading his second one.)[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]
[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]"The Bogleheads Guide to Investing" by Taylor Larimore et al https://www.amazon.com/Bogleheads-Guide-Investing-Taylor-Larimore/dp/0470067365[/FONT]
 
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