“Whether someone wants to be independent with their finances is their absolute decision…but what I don’t want that decision to be based around is the fact that someone cannot see anymore…I want to help [people] realize that there are options.” - Liz Bottner
On this week’s episode, we get to know Chris Peterson and Liz Bottner of Penny Forward. Penny Forward is a non-profit organization that offers accessible financial wellness education and counseling programs for people who are blind or disabled. Chris started the organization in 2020, and together with Liz they are “boldly and bravely” breaking down barriers to financial counseling and education.
Chris and Liz share some of the ways managing personal finances is unique to someone who is blind or low-vision. They also remind us that, with all clients, it’s important to get to know each client individually - their needs, goals and aspirations. Learn how Penny Forward can be a resource to you, and the ways you can get involved and support their mission.
Show Notes:
1:27 Chris & LIz's journey into this space
4:06 From teaching to starting Penny Forward
9:00 Liz's background and being cohost
12:57 Personal finance and the blind community
18:30 Advice for professionals wanting to be more accessible
22:28 How can people get involved with Penny Forward
26:49 Chris & Liz's final 2 cents
Show Note Links:
Want to get involved with AFCPE®?
Here are a few places to start: Become a Member, Sign up for an Essentials Course, or Get AFC Certified today!
Want to support the podcast? We love partnering with organizations that share our mission and values. Download our media kit.
“Whether someone wants to be independent with their finances is their absolute decision…but what I don’t want that decision to be based around is the fact that someone cannot see anymore…I want to help [people] realize that there are options.” - Liz Bottner
On this week’s episode, we get to know Chris Peterson and Liz Bottner of Penny Forward. Penny Forward is a non-profit organization that offers accessible financial wellness education and counseling programs for people who are blind or disabled. Chris started the organization in 2020, and together with Liz they are “boldly and bravely” breaking down barriers to financial counseling and education.
Chris and Liz share some of the ways managing personal finances is unique to someone who is blind or low-vision. They also remind us that, with all clients, it’s important to get to know each client individually - their needs, goals and aspirations. Learn how Penny Forward can be a resource to you, and the ways you can get involved and support their mission.
Show Notes:
1:27 Chris & LIz's journey into this space
4:06 From teaching to starting Penny Forward
9:00 Liz's background and being cohost
12:57 Personal finance and the blind community
18:30 Advice for professionals wanting to be more accessible
22:28 How can people get involved with Penny Forward
26:49 Chris & Liz's final 2 cents
Show Note Links:
Want to get involved with AFCPE®?
Here are a few places to start: Become a Member, Sign up for an Essentials Course, or Get AFC Certified today!
Want to support the podcast? We love partnering with organizations that share our mission and values. Download our media kit.
Welcome to Real Money Real Experts, a podcast where leading financial counseling and coaching experts share their stories, their challenges, and their advice for helping people manage money in the real world. I'm your host, Rachel De , executive director of the Association for Financial Counseling and Planning Education for A F C P E. Today I am excited to welcome two guests to the show. Chris Peterson is the founder of Penny Forward, a nonprofit organization that offers accessible financial wellness, education, and counseling programs for people who are blind or disabled. Penny Forward's mission is to help people build the knowledge to confidently navigate the complicated landscape of personal finance through education, mentoring, and mutual support. And joining Chris is Liz Bonner , the vice President of the Penny Forward Board of Directors, and the co-host and co-producer of the Penny Forward podcast. Welcome Chris and Liz, thanks
Speaker 2:For having us. Thanks for having
Speaker 1:Us. Yes, thank you. Really excited to chat with you today, and I'm excited to introduce you and your organization. To our listeners, I always like to start off our episode by asking you to share a little bit about your journey into this space. And so Chris, I'll start with you. Would you tell us a little bit about your background and what inspired you to start Penny Forward ?
Speaker 2:I, by trade, am a software developer. I've been a software developer for the last 20 years, and I really didn't have a lot of interest in personal finance. Early in my career , uh, I knew that I should make good financial decisions. My fiance and my first wife were really the people that manage the finances in our house, and it wasn't something that I was terribly interested in, but as I got older and as I started to see how much we were able to save and how much we were able to do with that savings because my spouses made me save, essentially, I sort of drank the Kool-Aid and I got to be more interested in the idea of financial wellness. Another aspect of that is that I began working with a financial planner , um, I think at around that same timeframe around 20 years ago when I first started to embark on my career. And I remember he walked up my driveway. He had gotten my name from our church directory, and he walked up my driveway and introduced himself and asked if we could possibly set up a meeting. And again, I wasn't necessarily interested, but I also knew that I should probably make good financial decisions. And so I didn't wanna say no either. So we set up the meeting and we bought life insurance and started investing in mutual funds at the age of about 23. And that by itself didn't spur me towards an interest in personal finance, but over time, again, I started to see the returns we were getting on our investments. We were meeting with our financial advisor once or twice a year, and I was having interesting conversations with them and then starting to do my own research and, and embark on my own learning journey. And probably about five years ago, my financial advisor said, you know, Chris, you're really good at this. Maybe you should think about this as a career. Oh, wow. And I didn't spend a ton of time thinking about it as a career at that point, but I started to get burnt out on my software development career and I thought maybe I would wanna make a, a shift. And when I started to think hard about that shift, doing something to teach personal finance was very high on my list.
Speaker 1:Where did you go from your interest in teaching about personal finance to starting Penny Forward and the mission behind that? Well,
Speaker 2:The first place I started was with the company that my financial advisor worked for. I asked him, well, how do I go about getting a job doing what you do? Mm-hmm. <affirmative> . And he connected me with his boss. I went in for some interviews, I filled out some applications and did some learning about what it took to be a financial advisor at the beginning of one's career. And I learned that a lot of it is being a salesperson, a salesperson of insurance products and, and investment products. And while I like insurance products and investment products, I sort of realized that I didn't so much wanna be a salesperson. I wanted to be a teacher. Some of my friends had started to ask me for advice about their own finances. Hey, how do I go find a financial advisor? I'm thinking about taking this new job across state lines and I'm gonna have to move. Is this a good thing for me to do or am I crazy? These kinds of questions. And so in order to be good at answering their questions for them, I would do research and I would try to come up with the most balanced answers that I could, not telling them what I would do, but really thinking about what their options were and trying to lay them out for them in a way that would help them to figure out what they really wanted to do. And so I, I was already thinking about trying to pursue a different path at the time that I was interviewing to be a financial advisor. And my wife came to me and said, oh, surprise, we're about to have another baby <laugh>. And uh, so that happened and, and sort of gave me cold feet a little bit, but also the company that I was interviewing with reached out to me completely separately through LinkedIn and said, we're looking for a lead software developer in Minneapolis. Would you be interested? And usually those messages don't tell you who the company is, but in this case they did. And I responded back and I said, well, you know, funny story. I actually have been interviewing to do this, but I am interested in this and here's why. And uh, so I ended up interviewing for a software development position and getting offered that position and , and then going back to the, the finance side and saying, you know, here's what I've decided to do and why I've decided to do it. And they were totally supportive and understanding of it and , and said, you know, maybe you can still learn about the business through, through the, your software development work, and you , you're always welcome to come back and try again later. And they told me something very interesting at the time that I think was, was pivotal towards me starting Penny Forward. And that was, you know, you don't have to have a license or any sort of credentials or be a financial advisor for a big company to teach personal finance. You can, and a lot of people do set up websites, do blogs, do podcasts, things like that, and can either be a way for you to start to build a market for yourself if you do decide to become a financial advisor, or can be a way for you to start a whole other stream of income doing the kind of teaching that you want to do. So I particularly, this all happened during 2019 and the pandemic, as we know it started in about March of 2020. And in 2020 I was thinking about starting Penny Forward . In fact, I put up my first blog article in January of 2020 and when the pandemic hit and we were all locked down and, and shut up in our houses, I thought, well, I have a whole bunch of spare time that I'm probably never gonna have again, so why don't I really lean into this hard? And I started a podcast and I started to talk with people that were listening to the podcast and reading my blog and my social media posts and tried to figure out what it was that they wanted from me. And sort of the consensus was, well, we should have a nonprofit organization that serves blind people because I am totally blind and nobody else is, is is helping us with our finances in that way. And so over the course of about a year, year and a half or so, I found enough people to recruit a small founding board of directors and fill out the paperwork to officially form the nonprofit organization that we now know as Penny Forward .
Speaker 1:That's fantastic. And I love the way your organization started and also the focus on community. You know, you were building this community even when you had the idea and before the organization became what it is today. And Liz, I'm curious, your background and were you the co-host of the podcast from day one, or when did you and Chris meet?
Speaker 3:My background is in blind rehabilitation. And so working with individuals who are blind or who have low vision to better themselves, whether that's through access technology or daily living skills, things like that, as part of daily living skills, some, some part of that is managing your money and being independent with that to the level that you want to be independent with it. I did not start the podcast from day one I, in July of 2021 I believe. I, through meeting Chris through a , a particular social media platform clubhouse, I learned about the podcast and was this , was introduced to it, listened to it, and kind of came to him with an idea I had about helping with the podcast. And he thanked me profusely for that idea, <laugh> , and said that he would be happy to have me help out with that particular thing. But he actually had another idea for my role and just hadn't told me yet. Okay, <laugh> then he pitched the idea of co-hosting the podcast, which is not the idea I originally had for myself, but that was the best thing that I decided to do because that role has now blossomed into other aspects of Penny Forward. And then to tie this into my personal background or professional and even personal background, I myself also blind and have obviously had to figure out how to deal with my finances. And that wasn't anything that I was taught as a kid growing up, whether it was in school or in public school, or even by the professionals who were helping me learn blindness, rehab skills, not rehab skills, but just blindness skills. And so it was really important for me to, to be able to, to have people realize because you can't see or maybe have trouble seeing your finances if you lose your sight later in life, there are still options to have you be able to do what you wanna do. And I, in working with, with students in my professional career as a blind rehab instructor, I many times would come face-to-face with someone who all but almost, they definitely did give up their financial independence. And that the response to me was, I just can't see it, so I just, I'm not gonna do it anymore. So my, my thinking is I want someone, whether someone wants to be independent with their finances or not is their absolute decision. And I will support that in whatever way I need to support that and they want me to support that. But what I don't want that decision to be based around is the fact that someone can't see anymore or cannot see to the level that they once did anymore. There are options to help that not be a factor or a barrier. And so that's, you know, if you choose that just because you you choose that and that's what you're comfortable with, that's fine. But if you choose that because you don't think that there are options out there, I want to help you realize that there actually are options and then you can make the decision for yourself after seeing those options, whether or not you still want to be independent with your finances. And that looks different to any , to everyone. Uh , so it , it really depends. But I , I never want anyone's answer to anything to be, oh, the , the vision loss is the reason I can't do something. There's maybe one thing that that is gonna keep someone from currently, which is driving, but <laugh> in some cases. But everything else we'll figure out how to, to do whatever it is if you know , if that's something that someone wants to pursue.
Speaker 1:Liz, I love that. And that's very empowering too. I think that's a lot of what's sort of behind your mission and your message too is , is really empowering people and giving them the tools to be successful. I'm curious to kind of build upon that. In what ways have you seen personal finance be unique for people who are blind?
Speaker 2:I would say that probably 80 to 90% of managing our finances is the same, whether you're blind or low vision or fully cited . However, there are some unique challenges that we have. Liz touched on one, which is if you can't see it, how do you do it? What are the skills that you need to have maybe the technology that you need to use in order to keep track of your finances, know what's going on, and be able to, to maintain a budget, keep track of your credit scores, keep track of your investments, all of those kinds of things. So that aspect is, is very important. There are also some differences with regard to government benefit programs, particularly social security is a big one. Many blind people receive either supplemental security income or social security disability insurance at some points during their lives. And we find that a lot of people start to receive ss s i when they're about 18 years old, or some even start to receive it when they're children. And they might be told by their friends, their family, their teachers that they need to be very careful with how much money they make or they'll lose their s s i income and they aren't necessarily told , uh, why that is or they can do to make that transition better. And so for a lot of people, they're frankly afraid to go and get a part-time job or to get a full-time job or to try to start a business and become self-employed because they don't know what impacts that is going to have on their social security income. To add to that, many blind people are not only blind, but have other disabilities or medical issues that may or may not be related to their blindness. And we find that in this day and age, that's actually more prevalent because many of the causes of blindness that were kind of traditional in the past, things like retinopathy of prematurity as an example, or or being blinded due to an industrial accident or a war injury or things like that, those causes aren't as common as they used to be. But some of the genetic causes and some of the other causes of blindness are more common and do come with extra baggage. And so people may feel that they need to rely on, on healthcare programs like Medicaid in order to be able to treat those, those other conditions. And Medicaid being a mean , uh, and Medicaid being a means tested program is also affected by your income. And so again, people not understanding how these programs work may be afraid to make any changes to their finances because they're afraid that that's going to impact their , uh, their Medicaid or social security incomes. And that fear is extremely valid, not only because making extra income has , uh, has an effect on those programs, but because those programs aren't run particularly well, we've really made a mess of them. And over 40%, this is according to the National Disability Institute, over 40% of people who received Social security benefits are informed that they were overpaid at least once during their lives. And they don't give you a lot of information about why that occurred or what you should do about it. In many cases, they just send you a letter and say, if you don't respond to this within 10 days, we're going to reduce your benefits. We might ask you to pay the money back and we're not going to really tell you how to go about appealing or, or getting that that waived or anything. And the letter may or may not come in an accessible format such as braille, which we have a right to receive. But if you don't tell the Social Security Administration that you need that they send you that letter in print, if you're in college, they might send it to your home address and your parents might get it. So all of these things just to add extra, extra challenges, extra barriers 'cause they really are barriers to having healthy finances as a blind person.
Speaker 3:Another challenge that is added is the fact that even before you can sometimes learn how to do certain things, especially technology related , you may need to learn how to use the technology itself. So it's not just as easy as learning how to use a program on the computer or an app on the smartphone. It may be first learning how to do things in terms of using the technology itself before you even add the financial piece to it. So that is in some cases definite fear and cause for hesitation in pursuing financial independence.
Speaker 1:Those are really great points. One of the things that I know we've really appreciated, you know, getting to know you all and Penny forward, you came to our symposium last November and you've since enrolled in the A F C program, but you've really been a resource to our team to provide feedback and guidance on how we can make our own programs more accessible. You know, it really is our mission to help bridge some of these gaps and in order to do that , um, we need to support counselors and professionals like you who are doing this work. I'm curious for our listeners out there, is there advice that you would give other financial professionals who want to ensure that the counseling and education that they're providing is more accessible to those who are blind?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I'm sure Liz will have some things to chime in with as well. First, recognize that blind people, by and large, have the same aspirations as the sighted clients that you might work with. Many blind people are parents supporting children. Many blind people are supporting aging parents as well, and some people are living alone. Some people want to be homeowners and some people simply want to rent and don't really want to think about the, the headaches of home ownership. So remembering that a blind person is first a person is really important, but also remembering that blindness means that they're going to perceive and process information differently and that you may need to get to know them is, is important as well. Being able to show them, for example, a an illustration in a lot of cases isn't going to work as well as it would for a sighted person, but you do need to remember that not all blind people have no vision. Some people have some vision and some people have quite a bit of vision. So being willing to ask and learn the unique needs of the person is, is really important. I really wanna stress this. Don't assume that just because you worked with one blind person that you know how to work with every blind person. Make sure that you understand that just like any client that you're working with that's new, it's a learning journey. You're getting to build a relationship with that person. And their needs may be similar to other clients you've served in the past, but they may be very different. And I believe that it's our job as financial counselors and yes, I'm an A F C candidate, is to understand those unique needs and and to tailor our approach to meeting people where they are, whether they are blind or visually impaired or fully sighted . Liz,
Speaker 3:The first thing I would say is to leave your possible misconceptions of people who are blind or who have low vision at the door as much as possible. You know, ask someone how you can help them or what the best way for them to learn is familiarize yourself related to the different aspirations that anyone and everyone has. Familiarize yourself with those aspirations or kinds of things that someone with a visual disability may have by virtue of, of having that in this case vision loss, that fully sighted client of yours may not have, such as using a guide dog needing to purchase a type of assistive technology. You don't need to know every single thing about every single thing. And that's also not possible. <laugh> my personal and professional opinion, but know it where you, if you have questions, can go to ask those questions. And Penny Forward is willing to be resource to answer those questions, but definitely figure out where someone is and meet them there and figure out where they would like to go and help them get there.
Speaker 1:I love that. And it kind of leads into my next question, how can people get involved with Penny Forward? Whether they're coming to you as a client or they're volunteering in some other way?
Speaker 2:I'm really glad you asked that because right now we are embarking on a community engagement process to start to build our strategic plan for the next three years. We have a community engagement summit that we are going to be holding over the next three weeks in September the 13th, the 20th, and the 27th. So if you can make it to any or all of those meetings, that's a great way to get plugged in. If you're hearing this though, after those meetings have taken place or you just couldn't make it, that doesn't mean that you can't get involved. We can use volunteers in all aspects of running a nonprofit organization and teaching people about personal finance particular areas that I think we could use volunteers in right now. Our help with the legal and financial aspects of running a nonprofit . So the governance side of things on the teaching side of things, technology particularly helping us to maintain our IT that supports our podcast and our online courses and, and website and so forth. Also providing written content, maybe audio content that teaches about personal finance, if that happens to be your passion. We also hold weekly members only group chats via Zoom where we talk about personal finance related topics. And so if you would like to get involved in leading those members only group chats, we would love to have you, it would really help us out because that's , uh, really, really a big burden for us to be trying to put on a, a different presentation every single week of the year. Um, and finally we are starting to offer one-on-one financial counseling to people that want it. And so having access to AFCs that would be willing to volunteer with us to offer that one-on-one financial counseling and to mentor us as a f c candidates would be very, very valuable. And then I'd be remiss if I meant didn't mention fundraising because as a young nonprofit it can be very challenging to go after grant opportunities and other funding opportunities. Many funders want to see that you have some sort of a track record and they wanna see that your budget is of a certain size before they will help to fund your organization. And so we need a lot of individual help in order to get us to that stage where we can rely on larger funding sources. All of our information is available through our website, which is penny forward.com . You can reach out to us by email at penny forward@pennyforward.com and we have a toll free phone number you can call us at, which is (888) 332-5558. And , uh, get it , get in touch with us in whatever way you like and we will find a way to plug you in as much or as little as you wanna be. Yeah,
Speaker 1:And Chris, we'll be sure to put all of that in the show notes as well to make it easy for our listeners to connect with you
Speaker 3:Related to the fact that yes, we could use help, we are also able and willing to help anyone in whatever way we can in terms of, as I mentioned before, being a resource if you have questions, if you're working with a client who is blind or who has low vision and how to possibly best help them. So yes, we are asking for your help, but we are not asking for that without providing help in return. I wanted to mention that another way that you can be plugged into us is through our mobile app, which can be downloaded from your app, store of choice and just tell people about us and word of mouth is a lot of times very, very powerful. So definitely be in touch.
Speaker 1:Chris and Liz, at the end of every interview, I like to ask our guests to share their 2 cents. If you had one piece of advice to leave with our listeners, what would it be?
Speaker 2:Be brave. I can't count the number of times that people have told me when I tell them about Penny forward. Well, gee, I'm really scared for you. You had a very successful software development career and you're throwing that all away to go after a nonprofit . That may not ever amount to anything. I push back on that. I , I really, I really hope that people will be brave, that they will be ambitious, that they will work hard to solve tough problems. And you know, we need, we need more of that. We need more of that and less , uh, less fear, uncertainty and doubt. Be brave
Speaker 3:While you're being brave. Also, be bold. Do not take no for an answer. If you are really passionate about something and you find something that brings you joy, figure out how to pursue that, whether it's by yourself or with other people. If in figuring out who can help you with that, you're getting pushed back from people who are saying, that's not a good idea. No, you shouldn't do that. Don't listen to them. Keep figuring out who you can find to help you because there are people out there. Just figure out what you wanna do and go do
Speaker 1:It. Chris and Liz, I love both of those responses. I think change doesn't happen without braveness and boldness and so we're really glad you're here and glad you came on today to share more about Penny Forward with our listeners. We will be sure to put all that information in the show notes. And thanks again. Thanks again to Chris and Liz for coming on the show today. As a reminder, check out the links in our show notes to see how you can get involved with Penny Forward's efforts and just a reminder that they also serve as a resource to you as well as we look ahead to the fall. If you haven't already, be sure to sign up to join us in New Orleans this November and December for the 2023 A F C P E symposium. Thanks for listening. We'll see you next time.