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Inclusive Wealth-Building for the LGBTQIA+ Community with Jeff from HOMO Money
53 Plays9 months ago
SUMMARY
Welcome to another episode of Dirty Money with Bevin and Mike! In this episode, Bevin and Mike are joined by Jeff from Homo Money! Jeff shares his journey from struggling freelancer to achieving financial stability and empowering others in the LGBTQ+ community to take control of their finances. We’ll hear about his military background, the stigma around frugality, building a supportive community, and the importance of financial literacy within the Queer community.
TOPICS
[1:57] All about Jeff
[6:50] From Film to Military Career
[15:25] Embracing Frugality
[22:00] Building Community Through Homo Money
[32:55] Balancing Passion with Full-Time Work
[41:35] Challenges Within the Queer Community
[52:08] Future Endeavors for Homo Money
RESOURCES & LINKS
Connect with Jeff
Instagram: @homo.money
Website: Homo Money
CONTACT INFO
Bevin Morgan:
Instagram: @bevinmorgan & @temple_eanna
Website: www.templeeanna.com & BevinMorgan.com
Mike Poulin:
Instagram: @mjpou56
Dirty Money Podcast:
Instagram: @dirtymoney_podcast
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to 'Dirty Money' and Content Warning
00:00:10
Speaker
Welcome to Dirty Money with Bevin. And Mike. A space to talk about financial topics for folks who don't fit into traditional financial spaces. We believe money is a tool for everyone. Our mission is to provide a literal microphone and platform for queer, BIPOC, polyamorous, and sex-positive individuals. No topic is off the table here.
00:00:31
Speaker
That being said, one tiny little housekeeping note. For those listening who may have others with sensitive ears, the listener discretion is advised because we do not censor ourselves. That's right. You've been warned, but enough from us. Let's get this episode started.
Guest Introduction: Jeff (Homo Money)
00:00:52
Speaker
Welcome back to another episode of Dirty Money with Bevin and Mike. Hey Bevin. Hey Mike.
00:00:59
Speaker
I will be your host today. Very excited for you guys to, if you don't know Jeff already, excited for you to meet him, hear his story. He is on Instagram as homo money. Jeff, welcome. I love it.
00:01:21
Speaker
I love it. Yeah, for our clients or our listeners that are not, don't have the video. He has Homo money as like brass knuckles on the video. So it's a, it's a, it's, we love the branding. It's like a very hip hop throwback. Like I'm here for all of it, all of it.
Jeff's Background and Financial Struggles
00:01:41
Speaker
Yeah. I'm all, I'm all about taking a dry subject, like personal finance. And like I like to say, let's throw some water on that shit.
00:01:49
Speaker
Yes, I love it. You are the right place. Tell our listeners a little bit about yourself, where you're from, and yeah, let's just dive into it. Sure, yeah, I'm from Illinois originally, grew up in a small town of the Midwest, came out to California for film school in LA. I was lucky enough that I got a Navy ROTC scholarship, so I was able to graduate without any student loans.
00:02:17
Speaker
After I graduated from undergrad, then I served in the military as an officer for six years. And that was difficult because it was during Don't Ask, Don't Tell. So had some trauma from that.
00:02:31
Speaker
Then got out of the military, tried to make things work as a freelance video producer. Cause that's what I went to college for and was not making any headway. It was 2008. The economy was in the toilet. Nobody had money. Small businesses didn't have money to hire video producers. And they didn't see like, well, why would I hire somebody to do video? Like I'm not getting married. They only thought that wedding videos was the only type of video that was like useful.
00:02:58
Speaker
So I did that for a couple years and hardly made any money. And because I wasn't making much money, I also, we had the real estate crash. And so I had used my VA loan from the military to get a house
00:03:14
Speaker
And a condo, first I had a condo, had all this equity just magically appear. So I was like, Oh, well, I'm going to take this equity and use it for down payment on a house. And then I had a condo in a house and then the market crashed and then my income dropped dramatically to like 10,000 to $12,000 a year. And then I lost both of them and just was like so humiliated that like me being the
00:03:41
Speaker
you know straight A student of my older brother and sister like I was kind of like the academic star and then I had this thing happen to me and then I felt like a total failure didn't have money to like go home to visit family to fly back to Illinois was contemplating like maybe I should
00:04:00
Speaker
like live out of my car because then I could shower at the gym and I would save so much money and I wasn't even thinking like that is me legitimizing becoming homeless because I was just like so short-sighted of just like I just need to get to the next week, the next month, maybe this next client is gonna come around and then I'll be able to actually like have steady income.
Financial Growth Through Frugality and Government Employment
00:04:24
Speaker
And so that financial trauma ended up being a really good thing for me because when I landed a government job in 2010,
00:04:34
Speaker
I already had felt that sting of just like scraping by and being like borderline poverty level and not knowing if I could make it to the next month. And so then when I had that steady income, I wasn't going to squander it. I wasn't going to just let lifestyle creep, take hold and just start spending more money. So for a solid 10 years, I.
00:04:59
Speaker
rented a bedroom with two other roommates in Hillcrest, San Diego. So it was like we were walking distance to everything in the gay community, but like I was not going to get an apartment to myself. I was going to keep my cost of living as low as possible, drove the same car for like 16 years before I finally upgraded. I kept the same cell phone for like, I don't know, eight or nine years. People would make fun of me. I still save it as like a prop.
00:05:27
Speaker
And so yeah, I did that for like 10 years. And before I knew it, I had to call my roommate and I said, hey, I was just updating my net worth on this app and I have half a million dollars. I don't even know how that happened. And he was just as amazed as I was. It seemed like it almost came out of the blue.
00:05:50
Speaker
And prior to that, I had saved up enough to buy a rental property, which I put onto Airbnb full-time. Because again, I didn't want to move into it. I didn't want my cost of living to go up. So I was just thinking, I need a steady foundation before I can loosen the reins on spending.
00:06:06
Speaker
And so yeah, like it was 500,000 in like 2020. And then we had that huge boom in the real estate market and the stock market. So then it was like, because I had enough skin in the game of like having a rental property. And then I bought my own condo finally during COVID. It was like, just a few years, half a million went to a million. And then I'm like, this is crazy. I would not believe it if I didn't see it for myself.
Homo Money Blog and Community Building
00:06:33
Speaker
And so I started a blog during COVID because I thought I can't be the only person out here out there that kind of thinks about frugality. I know that there's not a lot of us, but I figure if I was feeling kind of like I wasn't appreciated by some of my closest friends and my friend, my COVID bubble,
00:06:57
Speaker
And I just gone through a breakup with my boyfriend. And so I was like, you know, I know that there's got to be people out there. And instead of me trying to change myself to appeal to people who never appreciated me in the first place, like I'm going to just build a community, I'm going to find my tribe, and I'll just start from scratch.
00:07:16
Speaker
And so I created the blog, which turned into also an Instagram account. And that brand is kind of like, I want it to be like a lighthouse where I am kind of shining this light for other people who are like-minded and then have some representation in the personal finance space. So it's not just, you know, cis, straight, white, money bros. Yes, that is a subject near and dear to this podcast mission.
00:07:44
Speaker
There is so much to unpack there. Um, first of all, thank you for sharing your journey. I think in seven, I think you beat me. I think we joke. So our first two episodes was just getting to know the hosts. And I think I gave my whole life story. I think in 15 minutes and you did yours in seven. So like, I just kudos to you. You did an even better job than me. The thing that I wanted to.
00:08:15
Speaker
There's a few things in there that I want to touch on. The first one being, we don't need to spend because this is a money podcast, but as a veteran myself, as someone who is currently still serving in the reserves, who is using his degree in the military as a musician,
00:08:36
Speaker
What kind of, what path did you take in terms of the kind of officer route being, you studied film. So how did that translate to your military career and how did that help you?
00:08:52
Speaker
Well, they say for ROTC that you can get a degree in like anything you want. So like, I was like, all right, I'll call your bluff. Like I'm going to get a cinema production degree then. And so like, when you graduate from undergrad, like it doesn't really matter what your degree is in because you're taking, in my case, Naval science classes throughout.
00:09:18
Speaker
And we also had required courses in calculus and physics and international relations. So we kind of have a general education like foundation for what they're looking for when we graduate. Gotcha. Yeah.
Storytelling in the Navy and Personal Identity
00:09:33
Speaker
So I didn't really use my degree as my main part of my job, but they did tap me to like make some different promotional videos on my first ship.
00:09:43
Speaker
I was about to say, I was like, so obviously yes, like if you're a intelligence officer or whatever you were, you know, Navy uses all these different warfares for their officers, you know, whatever, we're not coming into that. I'm a Marine, so, you know, that's fine.
00:10:02
Speaker
You're the men's department. That's what they say, right? Exactly. Yes, yes. But the, I'm curious to what were some of the things that were surprising to you that you did use your degree in during your time in because yes, they are so different being in the military.
00:10:21
Speaker
being an officer of whatever type and a filmmaking degree, what were some of the outside of the making a few videos? Were there any, what I'm trying to ask is like, were there any skills that you learned from your degree that translated really well to the whole officer thing?
00:10:46
Speaker
Well, the first thing that comes to mind is storytelling. And in the Navy, it's like a pressure cooker where you're in this microcosm of like, you can't get away from these people. You're out on deployment and your whole life is, this is your social life. It's like everybody around you and people are eavesdropping on conversations because they don't got anything better to do. And so I had to employ lots of storytelling when questions came up, like,
00:11:15
Speaker
Oh, so what bars do you like to go to for in your free time, and what kind of girls do you like, you know, like, you like blondes brunettes, like, they would put me through the wringer. I don't know if that happened to you, Michael but
00:11:32
Speaker
I was lucky enough that I didn't enlist until I was 27. I did it backwards. I went to school first. So I was lucky enough where I was able to serve out
00:11:47
Speaker
But I still had instances where at the time I was married and they would see the ring and they would just be like, whenever you had a new unit or new thing, they'd just be like, oh, what does your wife do? They're just trying to create that connection. Don't Ask the Hotel was repealed, but it was still very new. And so there were a lot of people that had served in it. And then once I told them, I was like, my husband. And they're like, wait, you get the same benefits that I do? Like, yes.
00:12:18
Speaker
So yeah, similar but different. But that's really interesting about the storytelling. Thank you for... Actually, I didn't want to ask one more thing. So did you find yourself creating like a character for yourself during the start?
00:12:36
Speaker
Maybe in a way, well, I had to learn the art of like the half truth because I have moral issues with just outright lying. And so I had to find like, what are the different white lies that I could tell? And so I'd say like, no, I just don't have any game. I haven't met any girls, which is true because I wasn't going to straight bars to be girls. And I would say like, I'm just married to the Navy, you know?
00:13:04
Speaker
That's my job, that's my focus. They can't fault you for that. And on my second ship though, it's funny, you just reminded me, my first ship I was just trying to like fit in, kind of just blend in and be like the best officer I could. And then it just seemed like I had no fun, no personality and the people who were doing well, they were like not taking it so seriously and they were able to like be like hearted and have jokes.
00:13:32
Speaker
So on my second ship, I was like, I went out to an aircraft carrier out in Japan. And I and I thought like, well, I'm gonna not take myself seriously. And I'm going to be that guy who maybe add some levity to this super serious job. And my title was the third division officer in deck division, which is like, kind of like the hard labor, like,
00:13:56
Speaker
We paint the ships and do repairs on the hull and we'll have to clean the toilets when they break down, like repair the sewage system. It's like not a glamorous job at all. And there's like multiple divisions and I was the third division. So instead of me calling myself the third division officer, this was when P Diddy was kind of like a thing. So I called myself three Diddy.
00:14:22
Speaker
and like they would radio over and like, you know, if you respond on the radio, they say like, you know, Lieutenant Underwood, this is so-and-so, what's your status? And I would say, Three Diddy here, repeat, or Three Diddy out, like I would just like start branding myself kind of like a rapper, like it's kind of like throwing out their name at the beginning of a song. I was like trying to make it happen, like fetch.
00:14:50
Speaker
Yeah, I don't know that anybody actually would call me 3Diddy, but it's like I was always calling myself 3Diddy. You're like, you might not know who I am. I know who I am. 3Diddy loves to represent. Okay. I love that. Yeah.
00:15:06
Speaker
Thank you for indulging that part of that question. But the other thing that I wanted to circle back to is kind of before we get into the meat and potatoes of what we wanted to talk about, is you use the term frugality.
Intentional Spending vs. Being Cheap
00:15:26
Speaker
And I think that there's a lot of negative connotations with that in our society. I think a lot of it has to do with capitalism and advertising.
00:15:40
Speaker
I've what I have moved towards with my own clients to kind of rebrand that feeling of less is intentional spending. So things like how do thinking about things in a way
00:15:58
Speaker
What are your values? Let's figure out what's important to you and let's make sure that your spending lines up with that. And if we're thinking about it that way and with the goal-based savings too, it's less about frugality and more about how are these aligning with my life. And I think it's in tandem with frugality though, because I think frugality comes in the same kind of vein. I just, I feel like
00:16:26
Speaker
our society has made that word, that buzzword, specifically a little bit more, has a little bit more negative weight to it. What are your thoughts on that? Yeah, you mentioned intentional spending. I've said that same phrase before. I consider it like a form of mindfulness, where you're actually like you're thinking about what am I doing? Where am I dedicating my energy? And so that energy could be our time and our focus, but it could also be our money.
00:16:54
Speaker
And so like, if we're not being intentional and mindful about where we focusing that energy with whatever kind of energy it is, you know, we're going to feel drained because we're just kind of letting it go out in all directions. And then we're going to feel burnt out and then wonder like, what happened? Like,
00:17:10
Speaker
it's the end of the day, it's the end of the month, like, where did all my energy go? So it's like, if you want to conserve that energy, if you want to redirect it into something that's going to like fill you up and like, light you up, make you happier, like you need to be very focused and intentional, and you need to kind of find, where's that energy being wasted? And then where can I kind of salvage that and then put it in the right place. So
00:17:35
Speaker
I've also seen a lot of posts about like, you know, the word frugal being a bad word. I've seen a lot of posts of like cheap versus frugal. So if somebody has a bad connotation of frugal, I think that they're probably just misconsturing it with cheap.
00:17:52
Speaker
For sure. A good distinction of cheap versus frugal is like somebody who is frugal, they will go out to brunch with friends and they're still going to tip 20% at least because that's the right thing to do for service industry workers who are trying to survive.
00:18:15
Speaker
but they're probably gonna try to save money by like, hey, let's meet at my house, I'll get a bottle of Shampers, we'll make mimosas and we'll get our buzz on at my place, then we'll walk over to brunch and then we'll just eat there. So that would be a frugal person just trying to be mindful about their spending. A cheap person would say, we're gonna go out, we're gonna get all the drinks, we're gonna get all the food, we're gonna buy everything at the restaurant, but we're only gonna tip 10% because I gotta save some money.
00:18:42
Speaker
you know like a cheap person is going to screw somebody over a frugal person is going to find a way to just you know think mindfully and thoughtfully about it and then not have to make somebody else suffer. I'm so glad you I was I'm laughing over here because that is literally so here in DC I'm part of a Stonewall Kickball League and that's exactly right there are people that and I would even say a frugal person would
00:19:14
Speaker
either A, pick and plan which.
00:19:19
Speaker
social events they're gonna go to intentionally of like, hey, I know this week I set aside the funds or I know I feel good about this, where a cheap person is gonna go to everything, do everything, but yeah, either A, ask someone to cover the Uber or not tip at all, seen that, seen that before. Yeah, because they're overextended, their energy's just going out in all directions. Right, right.
00:19:49
Speaker
May I just say like I absolutely love that reframe that you just gave us because I've definitely heard this idea of like money being energy but I feel like the thing that you're saying right now is almost like the tantra of money right so it's just like really as you were saying like directing that energy into the places that you want in order to conserve like your whole
00:20:15
Speaker
body, like chakra alignment, you know, like that's just the coolest thing. And now I feel like somebody's got to write that book.
00:20:23
Speaker
Love it. Yeah. Get all those shockers open and every, all that she move in. Yeah. I related to your interview with the, uh, the pup because he was talking about being demisexual and that's how I identify. And like for me, you know, having sex is fine, but then having an emotional connection is better. Having sex with an emotional connection makes it like 10 times better in my mind. So it's like focusing all of those things. And I like to, since it's dirty money,
00:20:51
Speaker
I like to involve all five senses during sex. I'm like, I want to be seeing something hot. I want to be smelling something hot. I want to be tasting something hot. I want to be looking at something. I want to feel something hot. I want you to talk to me. I want to involve my ears. I want to evolve. Get all those shockers aligned. I was going to say, in that vein, I'm also a big fan of certain sensory deprivations because that makes other senses.
00:21:19
Speaker
heightened. Interesting. Yeah. So being like blindfolded will help your touch potentially. Heightened. Heightened. Yes. To the point where you need to be not blindfolded because you're overstimulated. So yes, I'm all for all of the senses, but I'm also giving you some homework to try.
00:21:48
Speaker
some sensory deprivation to see if those heighten other things. But that kind of segues really well into the, I want to hear more about your sense of how you've built this.
Building a Community Through Frugality
00:22:06
Speaker
You said that the people around you weren't kind of aligning with your values and the things that you've felt important. And so your drive to kind of
00:22:17
Speaker
find this community through the your
00:22:21
Speaker
blog and your Instagram. Tell us more about that. How has that been going? What has that been like? What, you know, challenges, triumphs. I just want to hear more about the, how you built that community. Yeah. So I started it in 2021 and my blog, just like any blog, when you're posting, you're going to have a very small circle of readers. It's going to be like your mom and then your closest, like two or three friends.
00:22:48
Speaker
In my case, it wasn't even my mom because she's not interested in personal finance. So I found starting out that. I would make a blog post and I would share it on Facebook because I'm 44. And that's that was the platform that I was still comfortable with at the time. Yeah. Yeah. And and, you know, on Facebook, it would actually get a good number of comments and people would engage with it and read it. And they seem to like it. And that gave me some really good encouragement early on.
00:23:17
Speaker
And then I would say a few months in, it was Veterans Day was coming up and I had already planned out a post that was going to be like, here's the two military benefits that helped me save $3,700 a month and buy my own condo.
00:23:33
Speaker
And the article was about the GI Bill and it was about the VA disability allowance. So, cause there's, there's a lot, even though like not everybody has access to these VA benefits, I like to think that it's really about seizing every opportunity that it's available to you. Yeah. It's really important too, that a quick note about that is that there are so many people that could
00:24:02
Speaker
take advantage of those benefits, but they either feel like, oh, I didn't, I wasn't, especially I feel like my generation that was in, you know, post.
00:24:12
Speaker
end of 2015 and then on, anyone that served, a lot of people didn't see combat. A lot of people haven't gone and done deployments and they feel guilty for like applying, even applying. And I'm like, no, those benefits are, you sold your body to the government for however many years, regardless of the work that you did, you are entitled to those benefits if you fit the criteria. If you, you know, you got discharged, you have honorable discharge,
00:24:42
Speaker
And all that, like that is you're leaving money on the table. So I totally agree on that because, you know, there are, that has been, that was a lifesaver for me during COVID.
00:24:54
Speaker
You know, and then last year I lost my job and thank goodness my health insurance wasn't tied to my employment and I still had income coming in because of my disability. So, you know, it was a lifesaver. It was a way for me to stay afloat in a sense without having to, you know, super stress. And the only reason I had that is because I applied when I was getting out. So yeah. And I think that.
00:25:20
Speaker
It can be a good lesson learned that you don't know what you don't know. And like when I got out and I had my exit physical, I, and then when I worked with different services that would help you reapply to get your disability rating increased.
00:25:35
Speaker
You know, a lot of times they would just kind of like put, they would put me in for every possible thing that might be wrong with me. And I didn't have any issue with that because I figured like, I don't even know like how I've been affected by these six years of service. I could have been exposed to different things like asbestos and hearing loss. And I may have just gotten used to it over time. So like, I'm going to go to every one of these medical appointments, have the doctors evaluate me and they'll tell me like, and so that ended up, you know,
00:26:05
Speaker
I had I think around 30% when I first got out and then maybe five years later got that bumped up to 50%. A few years later, it was like 80%. And then just in the last year, finally got it up to 100%.
Utilizing Military Benefits for Financial Opportunities
00:26:19
Speaker
And like, I think that there's probably benefits out there available to everyone.
00:26:26
Speaker
And it could be like HUD loans, FHA loans, you know, house hacking is like such a powerful thing to do where you get roommates or get a find a way to like rent out a portion of your home. I kind of did my own version of that where I live with my best friend in an apartment. And then our third roommate was we just found what was the comparable rent for the third bedroom. And that kind of gave us a little bit of like rent control where our rent never went up.
00:26:52
Speaker
Because we were just kind of charging more for whatever the cops were for that third-bedroom to me I consider that apartment hacking you know we did we didn't have the funds to buy our own place but we were kind of like creating a nice livable place like you would an Airbnb and then the person who moved in like everything was ready for them the girls were all included in.
00:27:13
Speaker
And so I think that like there are ways to like think outside the box and there are a lot of opportunities that are out there. It's like, but you just have to like knock on the door and you have to like look for that information and find people who are like doing the thing that you want to do and ask them like, Hey, how did you get there? Like, what are the services that you did or like, you know, there's probably stuff that is available to you that you haven't even looked into yet. I love that so much because I feel like you touched on.
00:27:41
Speaker
A lot of things are, one, house hacking. We should probably do a whole show around that because I agree it's such a powerful tool. But then two, just this idea of kind of like getting out of this shame space of figuring out what you have access to. And I feel like especially as Americans, we have so few safety nets that whatever we can take advantage of, we absolutely should. But you mentioned earlier that
00:28:10
Speaker
Like before you started doing your blog and things like this, you felt like your circle around you wasn't as much into the personal finance space. They didn't really kind of understand your head space around this. And so I'm just wondering, like, as you've been doing this work, have you seen people being resistant to, you know, frugality, finding the programs, like all of this kind of stuff?
00:28:36
Speaker
I think that it's steadily gaining a little bit more recognition just the same way that like index fund investing is getting more and more of a groundswell where people are starting to do investments themselves instead of hiring a third party to take this huge percent. I think that the ideas are finally starting to catch on. And I have noticed personally that when I first started
00:29:06
Speaker
it would, I would have a lot of people kind of make judgments about me and my brand. And they would say like,
00:29:17
Speaker
It was somebody I used to date actually said like, I hate that, that homo money thing that Jeff's doing. Like he was embarrassed by it because maybe I was like being playful with the idea of like homo money or because he probably never took the time to read the about me page. Whereas like homo, I have as an acronym for my four stages of hitting Fi, you know, hustle, own money and opulence. And so now because I put in that sweat equity,
00:29:45
Speaker
like and I kind of hustled in the early stages like now I'm at a place where I can enjoy some opulence before I get to retirement and so like everything's been very intentional but I think that it's very easy for people to just kind of like cast judgments and I had I made an Instagram post that's pinned right now about this guy at uh during pride of all times I uh I I went up to a small table of like some friends who I knew
00:30:12
Speaker
And there was a third guy there and I didn't really recognize him, but I think that we had maybe met on hinge and I didn't really, I wasn't vibing. I didn't want to like meet up in person. So I think that he wanted to kind of like kind of get back at me in some way. So in terms of like the perception and people wanting to just like throw shade.
00:30:31
Speaker
I was like, you know, approach the table was toasting everybody. Hey, happy pride. Happy pride. Oh, I don't think that we've met. I'm Jeff. And then the guy says, um, Oh, I know who you are. You're the guy with the award-winning podcast that nobody cares about. And then he walks off straight up like, Hey,
00:30:53
Speaker
Hater Asian, the whole, yeah. Right? And I was like, you know, I don't even have a podcast. I've been interviewed on podcasts, but it's like, you're throwing shade and you don't even know what you're talking about. That's kind of the best though, because you're just like, okay. Okay. So, so I think that like, you know, that kind of stuff would, I don't want to say it would bug me because I kind of thought it was a little funny in the, in the moment.
00:31:24
Speaker
but not having much response or much understanding early on. It did make it tough because it was like writing a blog post, making an Instagram post. It was like I was kind of sending this thing out into a void and not getting any kind of echo back. And like when I won my award for Best New Money Blog of 2022,
00:31:45
Speaker
I included a mention to one of my first Instagram followers, Kevin Calhoun, because I said like, hey, I want to dedicate this to Kevin because he was one of the first people who like, not just only followed me, but he like engaged with my content. And so it showed me, yeah, or even if it was just commenting.
00:32:08
Speaker
he showed me that like somebody is listening. And so it's like, I had that audience of one that it's like, I know that this isn't totally going to waste because I am hopefully making a difference in this one person's life to just keep going. So no, sorry, go ahead. But no, I just I thank you for saying that because I feel like
00:32:28
Speaker
We're doing this podcast and it's similar. It's like, does anybody hear us? And we can look at the stats when we see that people download the show, which is cool. But I think so many people these days are doing something around content. They've got a side hustle, they've got something going on. And you're right, it does feel like a void. And so having any interaction does feel like just such a huge deal.
00:32:53
Speaker
But, you know, this is a money podcast. And so I'm curious. So this home of money, like, is that your full time thing?
Homo Money as a Passion Project
00:33:00
Speaker
Oh, no. I mean, I guess I'm impressed that you would think it is. But no, I I work full time for the government. And then this is just like a passion project that I do on the side. And because I have.
00:33:13
Speaker
you know, the multimedia background, it's just kind of like, it's second nature for me to be able to come up with my own content and do all the visuals, the photography, graphic design, video production, to do the writing that goes into a caption or a video.
00:33:28
Speaker
And so, yeah, it's just something that I enjoy and I would continue to do even if I were retired right now because I like it. It's fun and it kind of continues that conversation like with my tribe because they're not necessarily local to where I live. So it's nice to kind of continue those conversations.
00:33:47
Speaker
with them virtually. And kind of back to your last question, it's kind of gotten to the point where after a few years, now people are starting to kind of DM me and say like, hey, could I meet up with you for coffee and get some advice? And that's been really flattering to know that like they trust me enough to meet me. And I've had
00:34:12
Speaker
Two close friends actually tell me how me just helping them understand the basics of like how they can DIY their finances.
00:34:20
Speaker
helped them just go off in such a more positive, confident direction where one girl, she learned how to do single stock investing, value investing, which is beyond my expertise. I just do index fund investing, but it lit a fire in her where she became really good at that and she attributed it to me giving her the confidence to just start moving forward.
00:34:46
Speaker
on her own. And then I had another it's a gay couple who they are
00:34:53
Speaker
over 10 years older than me, but they had a bunch of money just sitting in a checking account from when they sold a rental property and they didn't know the first thing about investing and they thought they were going to have to hire somebody. They offered to hire me and I said, well, that's not my expertise. Let me just share with you the basics and then you can just start doing it on your own.
00:35:17
Speaker
And now they said that they're like in such a good position. They got their money invested with Vanguard and then they got a Vanguard financial advisor that only charges them like $1,500 for like quarterly meetings to give them advice and very, very low percent like management fee, like 0.1% or something crazy.
00:35:38
Speaker
So it's nice, it's nice that people are like coming to me and I even had somebody like direct message me and say like, here's all of my financials. I'm just going to bear my soul of like, here's everything I make. Here's where I spend all my money. Help me. And I was like so flattered that he trusted me to just like bear, like show me all of that. We need to talk about boundaries with that one though. Holy smokes.
00:36:04
Speaker
Here are my passwords, and then just go for it. Let's start the conversation about boundaries. No, but all jokes aside, that is really amazing. I've had some pretty similar, as a personal financial coach over the last five years, I've had a lot of similar experiences where I had a friend in the community, in the gay community,
00:36:34
Speaker
Same kind of thing, a little bit older than me.
00:36:37
Speaker
his dad passed away and he just came into all this money and he's a pretty frugal person to begin with. And his brother was like, oh, you need to meet my guy, my investing guy, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And he was like, he told me that he had like the initial conversation with him and he was just like, the vibe was off. He's like, I don't, it does not feel good. I don't, he goes, I think I just need a basic understanding of like,
00:37:06
Speaker
what I need to do, because he's a very smart individual. Yeah. And he was like, can I pay you? Let's get dinner. I had just started at my new job, and so my job is a nonprofit, so I actually can't charge for any financial advice, because everything we do is for free. So I told him, I was like, I definitely would love to meet you for dinner. We can kind of talk about it.
00:37:36
Speaker
And just getting to know, you know, the questions that I was asking him of like, you know, okay, where are you at with these things? What's important to you? Where do you want? When do you think you'll need the money? I just helped him understand like asset allocation and like things that he should be looking for and what the
00:37:58
Speaker
The cost ratio is and how to look at those things, just the basics. Right. And he just was just so over the moon. Like a few weeks later, he like.
00:38:12
Speaker
texted me. He was like, thank you so much. This was incredible. I feel so much more confident. I'm definitely not going with that guy because I met with him again. Because I gave him some questions to ask the guy to see what his response would be. So I coached him through how to interview an advisor if he wanted to go that route.
00:38:35
Speaker
And he was like, I'm really glad that I spent that money on you at dinner because that has saved me so much money and it's going to make me so much money. And I was like.
00:38:47
Speaker
I used to have a financial advisor in, I think around 2013, and it was somebody that I met in a networking group because I was promoting my freelance video production company, which was like my side hustle while I had my government job. And so I was like willing to try all the other businesses there in the group because then hopefully that would be reciprocated and then they would try my business and refer me. So I signed up. Was it first command?
00:39:13
Speaker
No, I know that's, I know they really, yeah, they like to capitalize on military people.
00:39:24
Speaker
and sell life insurance. But anyway, sorry. Well, this company, they were doing the same thing. They were trying to get me to dedicate my extra money toward whole life insurance, even though I'm a single guy. I have no spouse, no kids, and it's a horrible investment, but they were saying that would be a good investment for me.
00:39:45
Speaker
And so then I saw the PBS frontline documentary called the retirement gamble. And it was, and it's like my favorite thing that gave me the confidence to start doing this myself. I have a Instagram post recently that kind of talks about the highlights of it and like how you can find it online for free.
00:40:05
Speaker
And that opened my eyes in just 45 minutes. I was like, oh, so I need to reduce my fees, go with a brokerage like Vanguard, not have these active managers. And then I asked to have a meeting with my financial advisor and I said, Hey, I saw this documentary on PBS. I think it would be great if you could watch it and then we could kind of talk about it together. And he wasn't even willing to watch it.
00:40:31
Speaker
And it was like, this is your industry. And he just kind of dismissed it like, oh, there's a lot of fake information out there. So this PBS documentary, he's your fake. You're not needed. I basically, yeah, that was the beginning of me saying, all right, well, I'm going to probably just pay the surrender fees and take my money out. I only had like 10,000 invested with him.
00:41:00
Speaker
But I was thinking like, if I have to pay like a 10% surrender fee to get this money out, better to do it now while it's $10,000. And then that's like my tuition of my financial education. Instead of I get like a hundred thousand a million. And then I feel like, well, I have to stick with them now because that's what they hope is that, you know, then you'll feel like you can't go back. You can't ever fire them.
Financial Pressures in the Gay Community
00:41:26
Speaker
So I do you the investments, right?
00:41:31
Speaker
This is something that I know, Jeff, you wanted to talk about, and I want to dive into this while we still have some time, is why do you think, and I have my own reasons, why do you think that the queer community, and I think specifically, I think we're talking like the queer male community, more specifically, I feel like,
00:42:00
Speaker
right is so far behind when it comes to things personal finance wise yeah i think there's a couple things at play but that's just my theory one thing at play is development rage how we are trying to overcompensate for the shame of being gay by being extra with like perfect wardrobe perfect job perfect
00:42:21
Speaker
physique, perfect car, perfect house, perfectly decorated house. And so all of that comes at a price because keeping up with the Jones is expensive, but keeping up with the gay Joneses who have velvet rage is going to be even more expensive. So like we may have disposable income, but we sure are good at finding a way to spend that. And so that's, that's one reason. And then the other reason that I think could be more systemic is that
00:42:50
Speaker
having survived the AIDS epidemic it's like our older generations of the Gabe community who came before us like they are survivors that they got through all of that and saw people dying all around them and so like those people who are 10 20 years older than us
00:43:11
Speaker
they didn't even see retirement as like that's not even an option. I'm not going to live long enough to retire. Why should I do that? Yeah, I think that that is a shared sentiment now outside of the queer community as well with younger generations with the way that the world is going. Right, yeah. So I think there's a little bit of that creeping in just
00:43:34
Speaker
across the board. I do want to dive into the first part that you talked about because my feeling is very similar in terms of in what I've seen in clients, but also within myself. And I think a lot of it has to do with not necessarily like, it's like the psychology of like, you didn't get to live your life the way that you wanted to.
00:44:03
Speaker
during, especially like developmental years, right? Depending on when you came out, depending on that can have such an impact on how you view everything else, right? If you are really coming into your own, into your late 20s, early 30s,
00:44:20
Speaker
you've just spent however many years not being yourself. And so it's not necessarily like, oh, I want to keep up with this, or I want to have the nicest things. It's almost like a self-sabotaging way to reclaim yourself. And I think that if we just don't talk about that side of coming out and what that does psychologically,
00:44:50
Speaker
and the things that you may feel once you come out. And I think a lot of it does bleed into finances because you now have disposable income. Usually when you come out, you're working, right? Not usually, but for a lot of people, they're at a point in their life where they don't have a caretaker. They are, you know, they're them. So, yeah.
00:45:13
Speaker
I think that that is such a huge part of it is the like psychology of like who you are, but also the grief that you weren't able to be you and then you add in childhood trauma, you add in trauma around money.
00:45:30
Speaker
you add it, mix all those things, and then you add disposable income, plus everything that they see in the community, if you're just like, you know, put into the, the, you know, I'm going to say the gay community, specifically, you know, on Instagram, everyone's going to this party, everyone's, you know, going to Puerto Vallarta, everyone's going to
00:45:52
Speaker
you know this cruise and this and you know and it's like if you're not if you are losing yourself in that you are not going to be intentional with your money because you're just so focused on trying to reclaim who you are and so definitely agree with that and I think that's something that isn't talked about enough.
00:46:12
Speaker
So to piggyback on that, like if you're straight, then it's, it's kind of joked about how a straight men, like wives will say, like, I have all these friends that I meet up with for girls night and for brunch. And my husband has one friend and as me.
00:46:29
Speaker
He doesn't have any friends. And I think that it's like, it's very easy when you're married to just be like, all right, well, this is my focus. I've got this nuclear family. I've got a wife, I've got kids and like, I want to, I want to be a good dad or mom. I want to like pour all my time into them.
00:46:46
Speaker
So like they are going to be my focus that society socially accepted. Whereas like for us like we may never have kids, we may never get married. And so like, it's so like crucial for us to have that chosen family like who are these friends that are going to be our family because maybe we were rejected.
00:47:06
Speaker
from our biological family. So everything you're saying, Mike, is like, yeah, it's even more amplified because we want to fit in. We want them to accept us. We want to go to these parties and things because otherwise we're excluded and now we lost our family. Right. And even you talked about it, the people you were around, you were trying to do the things that you wanted to do and they didn't
00:47:32
Speaker
they weren't about it. And it's like, well, you're far away from your actual family. And so how do you build that community, right? And for a lot of people, once again, if you're not thinking about being intentional with your money or know what's important to you, it's so easy. Consumerism, regardless, is easy to get tied up into, but I think it's just so magnified for so many reasons in the queer community.
00:47:58
Speaker
Yeah, because a lot of times we have more of it because things are just there's a lot of weight held on material items because or trips or whatever the case may be. And so, yeah, I think it's it's, you know, how and so the question is, how do we. Like start shifting that.
00:48:24
Speaker
I think that if someone is genuinely interested in improving their situation, not just playing the victim game and saying, well, I have this story and this story is I wanna cling to why I'm a victim and I want people to legitimize that.
Empowerment Through Financial Proactivity
00:48:42
Speaker
If you actually want to heal yourself, heal those wounds and like get to a position of like strength and autonomy and to have control over your life and to be independent,
00:48:54
Speaker
I think that it just takes some humility to say like, hey, how can I learn? What can I do differently? Who can I follow who might have a different way of looking at this instead of like expending all of your energy toward coming up with excuses of why you're where you are and why you have to stay where you are. Because I swear that if people like took all that energy of like,
00:49:23
Speaker
those excuses and they put it towards something productive, they would start seeing results the same way that if people took all that energy of stressing about maxing out a credit card and wondering, do I have enough money to go from month to month? That is a lot of brain power and a lot of emotional drain.
00:49:44
Speaker
And so to have a little bit of an emergency fund where you're not just burnt out emotionally, imagine how much better and more energized you could feel to then really make a positive difference in the next month, in the next month, in the next month. So I think instead of just feeling like I have to do all these things that I've always done and I see other people around me,
00:50:06
Speaker
that what they're doing like maybe go against the grain because we in the gay community our whole lives we're always going against the grain we have to have a pride month to remind people that we are legitimate and that our lives are valid and so like we live the rest of the year kind of trying to just remind people like we are human we deserve to be seen
00:50:30
Speaker
And so we have to, we've gotten used to being counter-cultural and having to go against the norm. So I would say we already have that muscle memory. So let's just apply that muscle memory toward our financial lives and say, Hey, I see all these people around me who are like stuck, stressed out. Well, I don't have to do that. Like I'm used to going against the grain. I can be my own person and I can forge a different path. I can find new mentors and a new community who can support me and encourage me. I love that.
00:51:00
Speaker
Thank you. I know we won't, we won't solve the problem on this podcast, but it's at least, you know, starting the conversation. So thank you for that. People just have to be willing to look for that community, you know, whether it's online, social media in a meetup group, you know, there's people out there and maybe it's not going to be the gay community initially. Maybe it's going to be straight people. Cause like my identifiers, I would, I'll tell you, like being gay is probably my third in the ranking. I consider myself to be more of a health nut fitness nut first.
00:51:28
Speaker
than like a money nerd and then a gay man. And so like, thank God that I like RuPaul's Drag Race, or that might drop me out of number three, that might like, I might lose my gay card altogether.
00:51:39
Speaker
I have found community like at the gym with straight people at these different conferences for personal finance. And so like, it's been great for me to just fill up my cup of like, I don't have to get it from the gay community. And it also, I think it alleviates the need of like, I don't have to be that guy that's always talking about money around people who don't aren't really that interested, because I've already scratched that itch talking about it with people who are so important. So I know that.
Future of Homo Money and Cultural Impact
00:52:07
Speaker
We wanted to, we want to honor your time, Jeff, and thank you so much for this conversation. I want to keep talking about the community thing, but I want to absolutely make sure that we ask you one last question. This is Mike's smiling because he knows this is my go-to. So with homo money, I'm assuming that you're planning to keep this thing going. I'm excited. I think it's dope. Will you please let us know, what is your future vision? What's next?
00:52:38
Speaker
what's happening with home away.
00:52:40
Speaker
You know, I'm kind of like just being present to whatever comes at me and not trying to overthink it and overplan it because I really am enjoying the process. I'm not going to try to like buy followers or do anything to like game the system and have it grow inorganically. I want it to like just if you go to my Instagram, it's going to be like real people that are commenting and there's not a bunch of bots that are leaving comments and you have to sort through all that.
00:53:08
Speaker
So I think like I would love to get personal finance to the point where it's like in the pop cultural zeitgeist of like one of one of the visions that I've always had is because I love RuPaul's Drag Race.
00:53:24
Speaker
I would love to have a cameo on Drag Race where it's like one of the many challenges in the first half of the episode is like RuPaul shows up and says okay hello hello hello girls so gather round
00:53:39
Speaker
So we've got a special guest here, Jeff with Homo Money. He's a gay blogger from our community and he's got all these blog posts about how you can save more and make more. So your challenge is going to be to take a blog post as source material and then turn it into a fun skit.
00:53:57
Speaker
And so then they form up into teams and then like, you know, take somebody who's a drag queen, who's a lot funnier than me, and then take this basic information that I've tried to judge up as much as I can, and then have them kind of pass the torch onto them, where it's like, I want to have more people talking about this in like a fun, sassy way. You're such a producer. I love that. Yeah, I love that. You heard it here first, like, let's make that happen. Like,
00:54:23
Speaker
It is, it's now out in the universe. So yeah, I love it. Tag and share this with a drag queen who you know, and we'll get that to RuPaul's direct messages. We do know a few. We know some. All right. A few have been in my DMs before. That's a different podcast. Oh. Six degrees of separation. It's a real thing.
00:54:50
Speaker
On that note, thank you so much, Jeff, for your coming on the show today, telling us about your journey. Really great information. Is there anything before we sign off that you'd like to leave our listeners with, any nuggets or thought? If you're looking for me, it's homo.money because there's a lot of imposters out there.
00:55:15
Speaker
And that's my, that's my URL for my blog. It's also my handle on Instagram. And I would say that, you know, looking out for the imposters, I guess would be my final tip because I don't pay the, I think it's $20, $25 a month to have the verified checkmark.
00:55:31
Speaker
I just go through and I report imposters every time they pop up. If I see imposters of other accounts, I will report them and get them blocked. I would say if you're following somebody and you want to make sure it's credible information,
00:55:47
Speaker
to see if you have mutual followers. If you have kind of dipped your toe into the personal finance pool and you've started following some of the big names, if you have friends who are following it, if you find somebody to follow, it'll say before you hit the follow button, they're already being followed by so and so, so and so. If it's a legit person, they'll already have some people who are following them who recognize this is the real person. And I never,
00:56:16
Speaker
And I'm never going to DM anybody about crypto. That's not my thing. I'm not going to try to get you to buy some kind of investment. That's what those imposters do. Yes. And so I want to get them shut down as quick as possible. Yes. That's very important. Well, thank you so much, Jeff.
00:56:33
Speaker
really appreciate you being here and we're going to have to, we'll have to get you back. There's just so much to unpack. So this was a lot of fun. So I totally be up for it. Awesome. Thank you so much. And to our listeners until next time. Bye.
00:57:00
Speaker
If you've enjoyed today's episode, please don't forget to rate, review, and subscribe. That's the easiest way to support our show. We hope you took away a new nugget of information or perspective today, and we're grateful you took the time to listen to us. Until next time, bye. Bye.