Real Money, Real Experts

From the Vault: Jen Hemphill: Why Her Dinero Matters

October 12, 2021 AFCPE® Season 1 Episode 37
Real Money, Real Experts
From the Vault: Jen Hemphill: Why Her Dinero Matters
Show Notes Transcript

In honor of Hispanic/Latinx Heritage Month, we are re-releasing our conversation with Jen Hemphill, AFC®, host of the Her Dinero Matters podcast.

This blog post includes additional information on the unique barriers to financial well-being that members of the Latinx community may encounter as well as resources to use with your Latinx clients.

In this episode of Real Money, Real Experts co-hosts Rebecca Wiggins and Dr. Mary Bell Carlson talk to award-winning podcaster and AFC® Jen Hemphill. Jen has devoted her career to helping women feel like the queen of their financial lives, and is committed to helping Latinas across the US find financial freedom.

The three discuss Jen’s journey from military spouse to AFC®. Covering important topics like building a private practice, defining your niche, and having multiple streams of income, Jen openly shares her journey and the mistakes that she made along the way. Jen also touches on the important ways that culture impacts our money decisions. Tune in to learn more about Jen’s experiences, and to gain a new perspective to better support your clients.

Show Notes:

00:52 Jen Introduction
05:09 Jen’s Journey to Personal Finance
12:05 Building her Private Practice
16:22 Finding your Niche
19:14 Finances and the Latinx Community
25:27 Growing your Business & Having Multiple Sources of Income
32:54  Writing and Self-Publishing Her Dinero Matters 
38:02 Your Two Cents

Show Note Links:

Get in Contact with Jen!

Website:
https://jenhemphill.com/
Podcast: https://jenhemphill.com/her-dinero-matters-podcast/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/jenhemphilll
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/moneywithjen/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jenhemphill/ & https://www.instagram.com/herdineromatters/
Linked In: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jenhemphill/

Resources

Money as You Grow resource for parents:
https://www.consumerfinance.gov/consumer-tools/money-as-you-grow/

Her Dinero Matters:  https://jenhemphill.com/book

Resources for Inclusion of Latinx Community:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1zNIvlgiqgusYVlri9XRCW1GX5_j0mL7S/view?usp=sharing

FINRA Foundation Military Spouse Fellowship for the AFC(R): https://www.afcpe.org/career-and-resource-center/finra-foundation-military-spouse-fellowship/

AFCPE Membership:

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.

Intro (00:02):

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, Rebecca Wiggins, Executive Director of the Association for Financial Counseling and Planning Education® or AFCPE®. And I'm your cohost, Dr. Mary Bell Carlson. I'm an Accredited Financial Counselor®, or AFC®, and the CEO of Chief Financial Mom. Every episode, we're taking a deep dive into the topics that the personal finance professionals care about: helping clients, building community and your professional growth. Welcome everyone to the Real Money, Real Experts podcast. I'm Rebecca. This is Mary.

Dr. Mary Bell Carlson (00:50):

Thanks for taking the time to join us today.

Rebecca Wiggins (00:52):

Today on the show we're talking with Jen Hemphill. Jen is a military spouse and proud bilingual Latina. She has devoted her career to helping other busy career oriented women become the Raina or queen of their money. She's a Latina money expert, an AFC® and an author and speaker. Jen also hosts the, "Her Dinero Matters" an award-winning podcast that focuses on the advancement of Latinas in the United States to minimize the gender wage gap while also creating a space for healthy, confident conversations around money. She's been featured in publications like Forbes, US News and World Report, Oprah Magazine, Good Company Magazine, and Grow and Yahoo finance. Jen also currently serves on the AFCPE® board of directors. We have so much to talk to you about today Jen. Welcome to the podcast.

Jen Hemphill (01:42):

Well, thank you so much for having me. I'm really excited to do this.

Dr. Mary Bell Carlson (01:46):

Jen, I can remember me the you several years ago at an AFCPE Symposium and you were just getting started and I just am amazed at how far you've come in such a short time period. Would you start at the beginning and tell us a little more about your story and how you got here?

Jen Hemphill (02:02):

Sure. Well, I am a product of two cultures. So I was born in Columbia and my dad's American and we moved to the States when we, I was about eight years old. Now, in hindsight with that, I grew up in a household where there was always a lack of money. There was always that challenge of there wasn't enough money. We can't afford this. And that is something that I heard over and over again as I grew up. And so I was that kid at 10 years of age that I didn't even ask my parents for money to go buy an ice cream cone or whatnot because they have already told me they didn't have any money. I was that kid also that looked for opportunities to make some money because I wanted the ice cream comb or I wanted to buy the Barbie doll or I wanted to buy the tree torn tennis shoes that was later in my middle school years because my parents didn't have that money. So finances was a huge part of my upbringing because of that lack of, and I was very determined early on to not be in that predicament. And so it led me on a path to be financially savvy, if you will, reading personal finance books. And eventually it led me to AFCPE and, but really for me, the big part of my story is just always having the challenge with finances, whether it was that always that lack of, and even though as I became an adult, became married, I noticed that even though I had learned all those personal finance tips and I implemented them, I found myself 10 years into our marriage. We were still in debt. We were really depleting our emergency savings and we had borrowed from our 401k. And this was a point in my life where I was actually going, getting my AFC. And I was feeling, I felt a lot of shame just because I was looked at from my family, for my family and friends. I was looked upon as a financially savvy. They were coming to me for advice with finances because they felt like I had it together. But yet when I was looking at our finances, not that we were in a bad financial situation, but we weren't in a situation where I thought we would beat 10 years down the line. And so that led me on another path to figuring out if I'm implementing the typical lessons of save more, spend less and get out of debt. Why aren't we there? Right. So that's just a little bit about me.

Rebecca Wiggins (04:46):

Jen. So you're also a military spouse and earned your AFC through the Military Spouse Fellowship. Can you tell us a little bit about what made you go for that and where were you in your, you said you had started to learn a lot and read a lot about personal finance. Would you say you were still a newbie in the field at that point, but when you were going into the fellowship or kind of what made you want to apply for that?

Jen Hemphill (05:09):

So, when I learned about the fellowship, we were stationed at McConnell Air Force Base in Wichita, Kansas. And I was actually in real estate. I was selling real estate at the time. It was a time in our lives where financially we were having a difficult time. We were moved back to the States. We were living in Peru. When we moved back to the States, I found out I was pregnant with our second son. And at that time we had a house in Arizona that the tenants were leaving and we were going to sell it because the market was booming. And all of a sudden when we put the house on the market, the market crashed. So when we moved to Wichita or when we PCS to Wichita, we were not only seeing a decrease in income because overseas getting more income. But yet we came to Wichita at a time where our income was different, right. Or decrease because, the overseas, the, all that went away and we were paying rent and a mortgage at the same time and I was pregnant. And so I had to figure out what was I going to do? Because I felt the stress right. Of really our, our little one, our, our first born, he was going to be in preschool or do, do I put him in daycare? What do I do for him? And so that, that was a part of the challenge. That's how I went into real estate. And then later down the line, my husband sent me an email or forwarded me an email that was from the FINRA Military Spouse Fellowship Program. And he's like, I think this will interest you. And he was, you know, he was spot on just because finances because of the challenges growing up. And because of that challenge that we were dealing with at this moment in time, that was something that I wanted to learn more about. And on top of that is as a real estate agent, I was finding, I work with a lot of first-time home buyers, and I was finding that their finances in terms of their, their knowledge of their finances, they were really wanting if the, if the mortgage lender approved them for X amount of money for the home, they wanted to go with that versus what they really could afford. So that was the aspect that was the personal, and also what I was seeing in real estate as well. So that led me to, yes, let's see where this takes me. That's where it started.

Rebecca Wiggins (07:31):

Yeah. I think you make such a great point too about, and I know we've talked about this before, just about encouraging other people to apply for the fellowship and not thinking that you have to know everything about finance or already kind of be in the profession. Because as you're describing, it really helps you and your individual circumstance and your family. And then the other part of it is you're also then able to give back to the military community and to others. And I think that's an important part that sometimes we miss when we tell that story. So I appreciate you bringing that up.

Jen Hemphill (08:00):

Oh, absolutely.

Dr. Mary Bell Carlson (08:01):

And Jen, keep going forward with your story, because I believe your oldest is now in high school. So how have you gone from being in debt and from the borrowing to where you are today? How has that story progressed?

Jen Hemphill (08:12):

Yeah, so basically, yeah, my son is in high school. He's actually getting ready to graduate this year. So I'm trying to deal with that. Send me all the tissues please. But basically it took us a while because when 10 years into our marriage just was the pivot point for me. Right. And then at that time, 10 years into our marriage, I had literally just started the AFC or I had done the classes, but I had, I really took the full three years because it took me that long to get my hours in. But that was, I was getting those hours in at that time. And that's when I was realizing, okay, what am I doing wrong? And even from then, so that was, we were in Jersey and I have to, I can't do years. I can do where we were living a typical military spouse. And the, from there we move to, I think, oh, we went back to Kansas and then in North Dakota, or I call it the North Pole, that's when things started to change because I was looking, I had been looking at our finances just by the book. Meaning if the experts say, do this, you need to do it this way, versus trusting my own instincts and being confident that I knew what needed to be done, because I knew our family, I knew our needs. I knew our, what, what we wanted to strive for, not the experts. And so once I took that into consideration, once I realized that my upbringing also impacted my mindset, that's when things started to shift. So we were in North Dakota and we find, and we really, really committed to getting out of debt. And so we started that process and I started really working on my mindset as well. And we were able to make some progress with our debts. Now, when we moved here to DC, which, we've been here forever, that's not typical for us. That's when really we ended up, cause when we moved to DC, we were still in about $30,000 of debt of student loans in that. And we ended up paying that in about three years. Right. So something like that give or take, right. And it wasn't, so it wasn't necessarily that the change didn't happen right away. It took some time for me to really understand what was going on with my mindset and shifting that mindset, making sure that I trusted my instincts and really looking at, okay, this is what the experts tell me I should do. Does this make sense for me at this moment or make sense for our family at this moment in time? And once I trusted myself, became more confident with our finances and again, worked on that mindset. That's when things started to shift much more easily and much faster.

Dr. Mary Bell Carlson (11:05):

You know, the interesting observation is North Dakota versus Washington DC area. It's a much higher cost of living out here in DC. And yet you were still able to pay off debt even in a much higher cost of living area. So I think it has a lot to do with it. What you keep talking about, the mindset. The other side that I, really is interesting to me is the fact that this is personal. So of course there's experts that will give you all kinds of information and says, everyone should do it this way. But the end of the day, there's a reason it's called personal financial planning or personal financial counseling is because everyone's family looks different. And so just because the expert does it this way, that doesn't mean that you have to follow that exact same template. You need to mold it. And like you were saying, create that confidence, create that ability for your family to thrive, which may look different than other families. You've built a very successful practice. Tell us more about how your practice operates.

Jen Hemphill (12:06):

Well, basically it's been a long journey. Meaning, I have made so many mistakes. There has been so many times where I've wanted to quit because I just felt like I wasn't seeing the progress that I wanted to see. And what I've learned along the way was that really I'm, needed what I was doing. I was seeking mentorship, right. And I was seeking coaches and I was seeking for someone that would help me, but what, and I learned stuff from them. And then this is not saying anything negative about the people that I invested in, but they didn't understand the personal finance field. So that was a big factor. So they were guiding me on what had worked for them versus what could work for me in the field that I'm in because of personal finance. Well, let's face it. You're if you're wanting to work one-on-one with people, you really have to understand which people are you wanting to serve. Because depending on that person, the pricing is going to be different because of what they can afford. Right. And, and so, that took me a long time to figure out, honestly, and like I said, it has been painful. And, and so it's at the beginning, my practice, I didn't know. I mean, you, at the beginning, you don't know anything. So I was thinking, well, I'm going to coach people. That's what I'm going to do. Right? That's why I'm an Accredited Financial Counselor and we could do this on Skype. Well, and now it's not Skype anymore, but it's more zoom. And when I started that, I thought that that was the only way. But I learned as time went on that I really needed to add on other streams of income. Because again, that one and one coaching can only take you so far. You may not be the only in, depending on your specific niche and the people that you are serving. You may not, may only be able to charge so much. That because it's, again, at the end of the day, it's about what they can afford. And if they value it, right, it's not like business coaches where they can put a value on their, you can put a value on what you do obviously. But what I'm saying is business coaches, people will invest more in a business coach, right. Or invest in someone that will help them make more money. Versus they will easily put that the money to a business coach versus getting their finances together because they see the opportunity to make more money and they feel that's the solution. Right? But making more money is not always a solution. You have to address the behaviors. We know this, right. And, but people, that's just the nature of people like, well, if I make more money, my problems are solved. And so I got on a sidetrack there. So the one-on-one coaching, I don't do it as much anymore just because it's not scalable. So I've added different income streams because that has allowed me to grow faster with a one-on-one coaching, it wasn't allowing me for me to grow. It was just the static. It was very stagnant in terms of the growth. But as I added more income streams, when I now work with, brands, of course podcast sponsors those types of things that has allowed me to grow more easily. So really for me, is finding a coach that understands a personal finance field and really how it works and how you can scale it, how you can really, you build a structure, your business around it and adding multiple streams of income. You can't just rely on, especially if you're wanting to grow the business. Like if you're just looking for X amount of money a month, yes. You can just do one-on-one coaching. But if you're truly wanting to build a business and grow it, that one-on-one coaching itself is not going to cut it because you can't scale it. There's only one of you and many people. And the other thing, and I think I mentioned, you need to be clear on who you want to serve. That took me a while to figure it out. I was like, well, women, well, all women are different. And then finally, I feel like I'm getting it together and working on the, with the Latinx community. And you also have to trust your gut and confidence is just so essential with everything. And I wasn't trusting my gut for a long time.

Rebecca Wiggins (16:22):

It's really important what you're talking about in terms of knowing who you are. But I also would imagine that what you were just describing as kind of figuring out what your niche is, that, that, that could be a little bit scary at the outset, right? Because you're already limiting in your mind, you're already sort of limiting who you're going to be reaching. And that might be, that might sort of feel counterintuitive. So can you talk a little bit about that process of how you came to really be comfortable with, and then how that has actually served you by sort of naming, I am serving the Latinx community first and foremost.

Jen Hemphill (16:54):

It just took a while. And I think it's just something that we're all gonna have to deal with. We're not going, because sometimes we think we want to go in one direction, like in terms of serving a certain niche. And then we start serving that niche and we realized that's not where, where we want to be. So I think it's, it's not, you know, even though if I share with you, yes, you need to be clear on your niche. Sometimes that takes a while because sometimes it takes some growth. It also depends on like how confident you are on yourself and what you're doing. And also depends on your experience in building a business. There's so many different factors that I think that impacts your, how fast you get to really clarifying what niche that you're really comfortable. And it, it took me a while at first, like I said, I was serving women and then I'm like, Oh, the professional woman that's busy and yes, these, there's a lot of women that are like that. Right. And so I had to, and now it's the US Latina, so I'm not serving all Latinas, but its that US Latina that is established in the US. So I'm not serving recent immigrants just because the approach is different, their needs are different. So the navigation of finances are different. So, and I don't know if I answered your question, Rebecca, cause I'm just going to different tangents, but I just think it's give yourself the grace and the time to, to figure it out. It's all in evolvement. And then the, what you learn, like it may not work out with a certain niche, but there's something that you always take away and learn from that experience. And that journey.

Rebecca Wiggins (18:33):

I think that's actually really helpful advice for people who are starting out, because I do think oftentimes we look at other people, like it'd be easy to look at you Jen, and see where you are today. And as Mary said, you know, you can look back a couple of years ago and we've known you through the years to see how far you've come. But if you're just looking at where you are today, you miss that you've also walked through some of those as you call them mistakes, but really those learning opportunities and that helped to continue to hone who you are, what your practice is and help you to become more focused. And so I actually think that's great advice for people who are just starting out, it's all a process, right?

Jen Hemphill (19:10):

It definitely is. And you never know where that process leads you.

Rebecca Wiggins (19:14):

Yes, exactly. So I'm actually curious if we could also dig in a little bit more to this specific community that you're serving, because I think it'd be really helpful for our network to understand what are those specific challenges that the Latinx community faces particularly around financial education and capability.

Jen Hemphill (19:34):

So basically what we need to keep in mind when working with the Latinx community is that we can't treat that whole Latinx community the same. We absolutely can't treat them the same. As I mentioned earlier, I serve the US Latina that has been established in the, here in the US. I don't serve recent immigrants. And there is a, there's a reason for that because the approach of how you teach them and what their needs are, are different. So first of all, we need to be aware of that. We just can't treat the whole Latinx community the same. It, we can't just say let's translate these materials in Spanish and your good. That's also not going to solve the problem. Translating the materials is helpful, but you also have to be aware that in our Latinx community, in these families, you have, besides multi-generations in the different households, you also have, in some households, you may have, the child who was born here in the U S the is the one that is fully bilingual. And then the parent that may not speak English and so that child is translating everything for, it's like the gatekeeper, right? It's, they're translating everything for that parent, but they may be 10 years old. They don't understand the finances, right? So you have to look at every, every community. You have to really understand that household, that family, that you're serving, are they recent immigrants? They may be undocumented. Granted, we're not going to be asking if they're undocumented. If they're undocumented, that's a whole different navigation of finances because there's some things they just aren't able to do because that social security number has power, right? That social security number does definitely has a lot of power. And can, if you don't have one, it limits what you can and cannot do. So the length in the country also can be a barrier in terms of not understanding the financial system. I already mentioned the immigration status. That can be a barrier. You've got DACA individuals that have that social security number, but they have some, benefits of it's being DACA. But there's also some things that they don't know how to navigate because they're not citizens. They are a DACA recipient. So there's those different types of barriers. I mean, we can go on and on about that, but those are primarily, it's just, again, not assuming that, I mean, it's not a barrier. We just can't assume that we can treat the whole Latinx community the same. We can't assume that translating materials in Spanish is the solution. It's like a part of what you can do. And then we have to understand their immigration status, the length in the country, cause that poses for some barriers.

Rebecca Wiggins (22:25):

So Jen, can you share a little bit more too about what the cultural norms around personal finance might be and how a financial counselor, particularly who is not from the Latinx community might be more aware of what those are?

Jen Hemphill (22:39):

Well, one is that as a community in general, we are always taught to be grateful for what we have, right? So that poses a challenge in the sense of, if we ha you know, we work to make the money to take care of the bills, and if we have enough, then why do we need more? Which poses that challenge of we're not saving enough. We're not building wealth because at the end of the day if your have everything that you need, why want more? Right. So that's one of the norms. Another norm is the spiritual one. There's that saying that I know in Columbia and other Latin American countries, we say, "Si Dios quiere," which means if God wants. So for them, that's an, you know, so if it's meant to be, it's meant to be, if not, it's that reliance on their spirituality to help them along life. Right. Which I think it's, is necessary, but I think there's also that actionable piece of having them understand that you can take action in the finances. It's okay to have more because there's also that cultural norm, that being rich is a bad thing just with their experience, right? There's also the work ethic. Latinos in general, they're hard workers because that's, they came to the US for a reason, they came to the US looking for a better way of life, because that's what they saw like in the US. You, you can work, make money, and you can have a better way of life. And other cultural norm is helping family. Being able to, which is another reason why a lot of people immigrate as well. They make more money and they can send money home. Right. Which also, that family component is, is essential to understand, because it's an important piece for them. And it like personal finances we know is personal. So we can't just tell them, no, you can't afford to send your family money. Like how can, it's a matter of figuring out how can they, and be able to do the other things and meet their goals? So those are some cultural norms. But the challenges too, I think, is important to discuss is the distrust of the financial system and is not necessarily because there's a distrust in the US financial system. Yes. Maybe somethings negative have happened, but it can stem from the experience in their home countries as well. So that's something to consider.

Dr. Mary Bell Carlson (25:06):

I really appreciate how authentic you are with your niche. You don't just talk to them, but you've walked through your own experiences and you relate to them through your story. You just have such a unique way of connecting with people. And I've really admired that about you.

Jen Hemphill (25:24):

Oh, thank you. I appreciate that.

Dr. Mary Bell Carlson (25:27):

So I am very curious, going back to your business practice. I think a lot of aspiring coaches and counselors are interested in how you've created this thriving practice. So talk to us a little bit more about other streams of income. You talked a lot about the one-on-one coaching and counseling, but talk to us, I know that at one point you had a blog, but now you're really more focused on your podcast. Tell us about the growth of the business and how it came about.

Jen Hemphill (25:51):

So yeah, let me address the blog because I think this is important. When you become a business owner, you need to have some sort of content is just like going to the ice cream store and they give you some samples to, for it, to help you decide which type of ice cream flavor you want. It's the same with business. You need to create some sort of content. So people can really trust you, can get to know you and see if you're a fit for, for them. And the way to do that is, can be in the form of a blog, which I found out was not the way for me. I was not consistent. You have to find that medium that you can be consistent with. So that can be blogging. That could be podcasting. That can be YouTube, doing videos, those types of things. And so you have to choose and figure out, I mean, I've experimented in blogging and failed miserably. I tried doing YouTube, but I felt like that just took too much time. And I wasn't at a point in business that I could outsource the help to edit and do like my makeup and my hair and that I wanted all I wanted to do it all. But, so I think understanding that you need to create some content cause that I didn't know that early on. And I was wondering why people weren't coming to me well, cause they didn't know anything about me and the way yes, you can do it through social media, but you also need to do it with, some sort of medium, again, blogging or YouTube or podcasts. And, and you have to figure out what that is. And the other aspect that I didn't, you also have to have some products or service. I think having a product, a digital product, whether a course or, some something that you can sell is also essential in creating or building. I should say, building your email list is very important. That's another aspect of building that, that I that's, that's helped me because social media is helpful and you can, you know, you can make a lot of great connections on social media, but at the end of the day, that can go away. Right. And what you have and you own, if you will, is your email list. And that's people that have opted in and say, yes, I want to hear from you. So you they've given you that permission for you to send them valuable content. And then whenever you have a service or a digital product, whatever that is, they've given you that permission to offer those things to them. So that has helped me. So I, I don't have a, I used to have a course, but I need to renovate. I'm getting ready to relaunch a membership because that gives a steady income stream. And so I'm getting ready to do that. The book is also another revenue stream that I have; podcast sponsors. I don't necessarily focus on continuously getting podcast sponsors because I can also quote unquote sponsor my own things on my episodes and podcast sponsorships is about relationships and pitching yourself and that's time consuming. And plus I'm very selective on those sponsors that I do say yes to. I've been fortunate that the sponsors have come to me. I don't necessarily have to pitch myself, but I don't always have sponsors in the show just because they have to be a good fit. I'm not going to necessarily do if some credit cards doing some promotion or what not because that's not the credit cards and that's not necessarily a solution for everyone. So I'm very careful as to who I have as a sponsor on the show, because I want to be able to authentically talk about it and get excited because I can't sell something that I don't get excited about. And if I don't feel comfortable about it, it just makes no sense for me just to take their money and do an ad read and it's not benefit them. So that's another source of income. Speaking is another one that has been a bigger income stream that speaking and the brand sponsorships. So brand sponsorships, that's just been something that I've been very fortunate because with working with brands, they tend to look at numbers, meaning social media following. And I don't, you can look at my social media now. I don't have hundreds and thousands of followers on social media, but I've been able to build relationships with different companies and businesses, which has led to most recently AARP sponsoring my first ever virtual event, which was amazing. i didn't even think, I didn't even see that. I mean, I, I did send, submit a proposal, but I didn't know where it was going to take me because I had done my research in terms of like financially, what would it take? How do I want to do this event? Paying, speakers doing good video production, et cetera, and paying every team members that I needed to pay, it was going to take money. And so I didn't know if they were going to say yes, but they saw my vision fortunately, and I'm always getting sidetracked. So speaking has been another that's, that's an easy one, I think is financial counselors that they can get into. With speaking, you have to figure out who, where do you want to speak? Right. And, and, and trust your instincts in terms of your, your pricing. Because if let's say you're just getting started, it's okay to do free speaking. But you, eventually the, unfortunately there's a lot of organizations and businesses and everything that they feel like they can, have you as a speaker and not pay which again, in some instances it make sense, but others, it just doesn't because then you're just speaking for free all the time. So you have to know who, where do you want to speak? It could be colleges, it could be different businesses. I mean, there's so many different opportunities there, for speaking. But speaking, I think is a really good fit for a lot of financial counselors, because you can talk about not just your story and your experience, but you can financially educate people. So those are like, I am adding more, because I think with the success of this event that there's, there's, there'll be another one coming. I crossing fingers. It was a lot of work. I'm saying this, just finishing this event off.

Rebecca Wiggins (32:22):

It's really important what you're saying about, you know, even as you're talking about building a speaking component of your practice, how important it is. I, I know, you know, as we're looking for speakers every year for our symposium. It's so important that that person differentiates themselves in clear way. That's how the team picks and the committee picks because it's somebody who really knows who they are and knows what they're going to speak in a way that really brings something to life in a new way for, for our audience. So I just think all of that makes total sense. I want to take a step back, cause you mentioned it briefly, but I'd love to hear more about your process for writing your book, Her Money Matters. Can you tell us, like, what made you want to write that book? I know that's quite an undertaking. What made you want to write it? And who did you write it for? Who do you hope reads it?

Jen Hemphill (33:09):

I honestly didn't see myself writing a book, and because of my podcast, again, this goes to the point is create content for people to get to know, like, and trust you because of my podcasts. I had been nominated for some awards for the Plutus award or I was a finalist. And from there, a small publisher, a small book publisher approached me and saying, look, I really like your content. Would you be willing to write a book about it? And in my mind, this was my honest reaction. I'm looking at it. I refresh my screen. I'm like, does he know I'm a podcaster? I don't have a blog for, you know, I don't blog quote unquote for a reason. And so at first I was like, there is no way I'm writing a book, but I realized that, and I'll be like, this is an opportunity that doesn't just come by because getting published traditionally is not an easy undertaking. So, long story short, I didn't go the traditional route. I did the self publishing. Like I am very thankful for that book publisher for giving me the opportunity and, and given me a kick in the butt to, to do this. But we just didn't see eye to eye with what he had in terms of the vision for the book and what I had it in terms of the vision for the book. And so I ended up, you know, had that mini script and I, I was like, either, I'm going to do the self publish or am I, or am I going to take the time to pitch myself and find an agent and a publisher that will publish this book, which I was like, I'm just ready to get this done. I found an editor and, someone to help me format the book in and getting on, on Amazon and all those different places because I wasn't going to take the time. It just, it was just too much to figure all that out. So the process for writing the book was just doing it a little at a time. I had a really, sticky notes on my wall of the different potential chapters. And from there I would tackle a chapter at a time and, it wasn't necessarily in an order. A particular order, I just did whatever, just resonated for me at that moment. And I just tackled it. And it took a while. One thing to know about the book writing process, especially if you're in business for yourself, it takes time and it takes you away from your business. So meaning that, that was a downtime in revenue because I was writing the book and I didn't have systems in place at that time where I continued to generate income. So just keep that in mind. It does, since it does take time, either have some savings or have some system in place that you're generating some passive income, because it does impact your, your, the time that it takes you away from your business. So keep that in mind. And in terms of like who it's for is basically a person who was like me. It really, I wrote that book from the viewpoint of, if you have done all the things, save more, spend less and get out of debt. And you feel like you're not moving the needle. And it's chances are it's because of the mindset that's who that person is for who has the person who has tried everything, that woman who has tried everything and is just not moving the needle. And, because of my book, I write it from the viewpoint of the, our mindset is like the foundation of any house when we're looking to buy. Again, I'm gonna take it to my real estate days. When we look at, when we look to purchase a home, one of the questions we ask is, is the foundation, is it stable? Is it, is it a strong sturdy foundation? Because with a house, if you buy a home that has foundation issues, you're always going to have issues with that house. It doesn't mean that your house is going to crumble and fall apart, but there always is going to be an issue. The same with mindset. It's like the foundation. So if you don't tackle your mindset, if you don't go back and understand your money stories from the past, you're going to recycle, you know, where you're going to repeat those cycles. And it doesn't mean that you're going to go broke, or you're going to go bankrupt because you didn't get a hold of your mindset, but there's always going to be issues in your financial household. You're not going to progress as much as you want to until you get a hold of that. So that's who the book is for. And the approach that I took is really for someone who has tried everything, but it's really not making as much progress as they wanted to.

Dr. Mary Bell Carlson (37:51):

Jen, this has been such an insightful time to spend with you and get to know more about you personally, as well as your business and how you're flourishing. We're just so pleased at your progress. Now, at the end of each of our interview, we like to get the guest's two cents, or biggest takeaways for our listeners. If you had one piece of advice to offer other financial professionals, what would it be?

Jen Hemphill (38:14):

I alluded it earlier, is trust yourself, know that, you know, what's best for your financial situation and your family, trust yourself and trust your instincts. Be confident in yourself.

Dr. Mary Bell Carlson (38:28):

Jen, thanks so much for joining us today. Will you just tell our listeners where they can connect with you? Sure.

Jen Hemphill (38:33):

You can just go to JenHemphill.com.

Rebecca Wiggins (38:36):

Awesome. And we're going to include some other links in the show notes. I know you had also shared with us one of your favorite resources, the Money as you Grow link, and some other things that you might find helpful for the Latinx community in particular. So if you want to follow Jen, we'll have all of those in the show notes as well. Jen, thanks so much. It was wonderful speaking with you today and thanks for sharing all your wisdom.

Jen Hemphill (38:59):

Thank you so much. I appreciate you both. I enjoyed my time with you.

Dr. Mary Bell Carlson (39:05):

Rebecca. I really love Jen for many different reasons. She's so authentic and approachable. She's real. I love the fact that she laughs at herself. She owns up to her mistakes and there's no façade that she's perfect or is telling anyone like, Oh, follow me. She just says, this is me. This is who I am. And she owns it. And I love hearing her confidence come through with her. It's something I've admired in her for a long time. Even if she's been unsure along this path, as you can hear from her story, it's not been a clear shot for her. There's been a lot of ups and downs and turns and changes. And yet she's just been confident along the way and stuck to the course. And I really admire that for her. She's, one thing that I think is great. She's really honed in on her niche. She's through time and through process figured out, like she said before, Oh, I want to serve women. Well, that is a huge segment. It's half the population of the world. Right? And so with that, I think it's really important that you don't just openly define a niche is, I want to work with a large group of people, that you really hone in. I think if she has come into her own of speaking to this Latinx community, she has been seen even more as an expert. The other thing I like about Jen is she has what I call a blue ocean mindset. In other words, rising tide, rises all boats. She's willing to help other people. She agrees that she doesn't have a control over the market, that she wants you to be successful right along with her. And that there's plenty of clients and others to serve along the way. My personal takeaway from Jen and for my own business is what she said in the need to create consistent content and build your email list. That was my big takeaway personally. What did you take away from it?

Rebecca Wiggins (40:54):

Oh gosh, I love speaking with Jen, cause as you said, she, first of all, I feel like she has so many different areas that we could have probably spent an entire podcast on just individually, you know, just talking a little bit more about the challenges with the Latinx community or the, all of the different things that she's done to build her practice and how useful that is for emerging professionals and those who want to follow in those footsteps. And I love what you said too, about how she has always owned who she is all along the journey and is open about that. I think so often we don't share the ups and downs as we're going through them and they're always like these hindsights. And I think she's just always been very open and approachable, as you said, a couple of quick things I thought, you know, I loved that said about how her upbringing was so connected to her money mindset. And I think how just important that is as an AFC professional and how that sets the AFC apart in so many ways is understanding that critical connection and just, I just loved that. And then she also did talk of course, about the multiple streams of income. I know Holly mentioned that and several others who have focused on private practice and just a really good bit of advice, I think she's, she's a great model, role model, mentor to others, and really embodies the passion and, you know, the, the real value, I guess, of AFCPE in our network and how rich it is in expertise and different areas that everyone represents. And, you know, obviously she's a military spouse, but didn't even get into that as much. But I do want to remind everyone that because we're still in financial literacy month, you can still get the buy one, get one for essentials courses through the rest of the month. And also speaking of military spouse fellowship, the application is still open and we would love it if you would promote those to other professionals as well and help, as Jen has done for so many help, be a bridge to other professionals that are starting out their careers, or just trying to get best practices from one another. I think we truly are better when we work together. So I've appreciated her example with that. And it was just great to talk with her to the day.

Dr. Mary Bell Carlson (42:55):

If you enjoyed the show today, please give us a rating and review and be sure to share it with a friend. Real Money Real Experts is available wherever you listen to your podcasts. And if you want to continue the conversation, consider joining the AFCPE Membership Community. As an AFCPE member, you gain access to resources, networking opportunities, and professional development that supports your work and your career. Learn more at our website afcpe.org.