Summer of Sass: How to Reclaim Your Financial Power After Divorce or Loss

What happens when your life suddenly shifts and you're left to figure out your finances alone? If you've gone through a divorce or lost a spouse, this episode is here to remind you that you are not broken and you are not alone.

In this Summer of Sass conversation, I’m joined by Rachel Burns, a certified financial planner and founder of True Worth Financial Planning. Rachel specializes in helping newly single women find clarity and confidence in their money, even after major life transitions.

We get real about mindset, rebuilding after financial setbacks, and the power of starting over. We also share our own stories of foreclosures, short sales, and bouncing back stronger than ever. This episode is packed with both strategy and soul.

🔑 KEY TAKEAWAYS

• The connection between wealth mindset and wealth management
  
  
• Why your past money mistakes don’t define you
  
  
• How to take control of your finances after divorce or the loss of a spouse
  
  
• The importance of setting clear financial goals before building a plan
  
  
• Smart strategies for saving, planning, and avoiding overwhelm
  
  
• How emotional healing and financial clarity go hand in hand
  
  
• The difference between being broke and having a scarcity mindset
  
  
• Why it’s okay to start small and build your confidence

Rachael Burns is a Certified Financial Planner and Certified Divorce Financial Analyst based in Folsom, California. She is the founder of True Worth Financial Planning, which helps newly single women feel confident and empowered in managing their finances after divorce or the death of a spouse. Rachael is a nationally recognized expert in women's finances and has been featured in publications including CNN Business, Business Insider, and Nerdwallet.

https://trueworthfp.com/
https://www.instagram.com/trueworthfp/ 
https://www.facebook.com/trueworthfinancialplanning 
https://www.linkedin.com/in/rachaelvburns/

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Transcript

[01:00:00:00 - 01:00:01:21]
 (Music)

[01:00:01:21 - 01:01:26:00]
Lisa Marie
 You're listening to Cash in SaaS. I'm Lisa Marie, your go-to gal for all things money. As the Sassy Wealth Queen and the brains behind the Sassy Wealth Coach, I'm here to take you on a thrilling ride from the financial chaos to Sassy and sexy money. Welcome back my Sassy friend to another episode of Cash in SaaS. I'm Lisa Marie, the Sassy Wealth Queen and the brains behind Sassy Wealth Coach, and of course this podcast. And with me today, I have Rachel Burns, who is a certified financial planner and a certified divorce financial analyst based in California. She is the founder of True Worth Financial Planning, which helps newly single women feel confident and empowered in managing their finances after divorce or a death of a spouse. Rachel is nationally recognized expert in women's finances and has been featured in publications including CNN Business, Business Insider, and Nerd Wallet. Thank you so much for being on my show today. I truly appreciate it. And I'm tickled to have you. And we're just going to dive in. Of course, my listeners know we're going to dive in and we're just going to talk all things money. And one of the things I wanted to talk with you is just your insight, personal stories, and we can go into it. But around that wealth mindset and that wealth management of how important it is to have both in order for us to be able to grow and flourish.

[01:01:27:11 - 01:02:01:12]
Rachel Burns
 Yeah, well, thank you for having me on, by the way. I would say your mindset is incredibly important when it comes to financial stuff. Because finances, I always say this, finances are not rocket science. They're not simple. It's complicated stuff, but it's something you can absolutely learn. But you have to have the mindset that you want to keep learning, you want to keep improving, you want to set goals, you want to reach those goals.

[01:02:03:08 - 01:02:09:22]
Rachel Burns
 You can have two people in exact same socioeconomic status, same whatever.

[01:02:11:06 - 01:02:46:03]
Rachel Burns
 And if their mindsets are different, their progress or lack thereof, I mean, it could be so different. So mindset has such a huge part of that. And we all have things that have happened in the past and mistakes that we've made. And depending on our mindset, we can either be defined by that and be stuck in that forever and ever, or we can move past that. And it really, I wish that there was some magical way to just like, "Oh, if you just do this thing, if you say these three words in the mirror or something, your finances will be great."

[01:02:46:03 - 01:02:47:21]
Speaker 7
 But really like- Your mindset changes.

[01:02:49:00 - 01:02:52:02]
Speaker 7
 You just got to change your mindset. That's not going to happen.

[01:02:53:04 - 01:02:54:07]
Speaker 7
 There's some things obviously,

[01:02:55:11 - 01:03:14:20]
Rachel Burns
 in addition to that, but mindset, I think is really like the foundation. And then the wealth management part, that comes later down the line. As you make more progress towards your goals, you start making more money, you start saving, you get more money problems,

[01:03:16:02 - 01:03:18:13]
Rachel Burns
 problems that go along with having more stuff to manage.

[01:03:19:16 - 01:03:31:12]
Rachel Burns
 But you don't have to worry about the wealth management first. Like start small, work on your mindset, make a commitment to learning, and then you can figure out how to manage your wealth later.

[01:03:31:12 - 01:03:40:18]
Lisa Marie
 Yeah, see, and when I do it, I do it slightly different. And again, I tell my clients there's more than one way to do it.

[01:03:42:18 - 01:03:55:05]
Lisa Marie
 A lot of times we work on the management and the mindset together, because a lot of times we're already, you know, my clients come to me, they're already in business. And if they don't figure out having some type of money roadmap to help them,

[01:03:56:15 - 01:04:00:08]
Lisa Marie
 they'll keep struggling and that keeps affecting their mindset.

[01:04:01:21 - 01:04:43:07]
Lisa Marie
 So what I do is it's similar. I start where they're at, and if their mindset is just so tanked in the bucket, then we focus on that. And then, you know, any emergency type thing that needs to be handled immediately with the wealth management, you know, with money management, wealth management, we will. And then if not, then we focus on that because you're right. If you're, you know, I tell people all the time, money mindset, money management, wealth mindset, wealth management, they go hand in hand. And the reason being is because you can have tons and tons and tons and tons of money. And if you don't have the mindset, you have a scarcity mindset, you have the lack mindset, you're still broke.

[01:04:44:23 - 01:05:03:11]
Lisa Marie
 You're still broke. And because a lot of times you end up spending it faster than you're getting it or whatever that may be. And so I know for me, my mindset was not what it is. I tell people all the time, I'm a wealth coach and then I'm like, oh, you've always had an awesome relationship with money. Well, no.

[01:05:05:16 - 01:05:12:09]
Lisa Marie
 Me and money did not get along. I didn't like money. I hated money for many, many, many, many years.

[01:05:14:02 - 01:05:34:09]
Lisa Marie
 And it wasn't until after I started my business that a money, a money mindset coach said something. And when she said it, it was an aha moment, you know, and she said, if someone treated you like crap, would you stick around? Would you come back? And I'm like, no. You know, all of us were like, no. And she's like, well, then why would money like.

[01:05:37:07 - 01:05:37:13]
Lisa Marie
 OK.

[01:05:38:16 - 01:05:49:09]
Lisa Marie
 And I just literally went in, you know how these rabbit holes, like you can go these rabbit holes when you start searching for stuff. I went into a deep rabbit hole on money mindset, money stories.

[01:05:50:21 - 01:06:34:22]
Lisa Marie
 All the things and just kept digging and kept researching and kept learning and started doing my own work. And I'm like, OK, this is the reason why this isn't working. This is this is stopping me. And I tell people all the time, when you keep up leveling in your business, there's going to be a new devil. So every level, there's going to be a new devil. And that's going to be that mindset coming and trying to tell you you're making a mistake or are you sure you can do this? And it's because you're up leveling to make more money. You're up leveling to make a bigger impact, which means more money. And you have to be able to work on that mindset in order to keep doing that, because if not, then none of it's going to none of it's going to work. You're going to end up broke again. Right.

[01:06:36:08 - 01:06:39:10]
Lisa Marie
 So when you how do you help your clients

[01:06:42:00 - 01:06:48:09]
Lisa Marie
 focus on the things with the financial planning, especially like after divorce or after a death, a loved one has died

[01:06:49:13 - 01:06:57:08]
Lisa Marie
 so that they can see that they can have, you know, a life according to their their desires and their values and

[01:06:59:13 - 01:07:03:11]
Lisa Marie
 and and they can be OK or more than OK.

[01:07:03:11 - 01:07:04:08]
Rachel Burns
 Yeah.

[01:07:05:15 - 01:07:35:21]
Rachel Burns
 And that is the main question that I hear is, am I going to be OK? It's a simple question, but it's a big question. So I work with women who are newly single and have gone just gone through some really difficult event like divorce or their spouse passes away. And the majority of the clients I work with were not in charge of the money in their relationship, which is normal. That's a normal thing that happens. You know, everyone, every relationship, there's a certain division of labor.

[01:07:36:23 - 01:07:54:12]
Rachel Burns
 And well, it happens after years and years of not really being involved in the finances, they feel really rusty. And when they are all of a sudden forced into this position where they have to manage their finances on their own, they're like, I don't know what I'm doing. I don't know what I have. I don't know.

[01:07:55:22 - 01:08:30:18]
Rachel Burns
 Like they just feel so helpless and so scared on top of all of the other big feelings that they're having about whatever just happened, whether it's divorce or a death. And so it's really it's a really overwhelming time to begin with. But then we stuck on a bunch of new financial responsibilities. And it makes people really uncomfortable and really fearful. And then they can't really move forward. And so that's where I come in and help them think, you know, to help them know that you are going to be OK.

[01:08:32:10 - 01:08:50:04]
Rachel Burns
 You're not going to figure everything out right this second, but we are going to come up with a plan so that you know, you know what you need to do and you know what you need to worry about. You know what you don't need to worry about. And then you can move on with your life. And then you're going to have more emotional bandwidth to like deal with the things that are actually important.

[01:08:53:13 - 01:09:07:19]
Lisa Marie
 Right, right. So what do you start them off with? What's normally the first thing for, you know, as far as when it comes to the bills and the expenses and the money and the financial stuff and me being a wealth coach, I I understand.

[01:09:10:17 - 01:09:21:19]
Lisa Marie
 All the things that can be involved in that. What's one of the first things that you normally like work with them on? Is it their minds? I mean, I would say their mindset because one, you know,

[01:09:22:21 - 01:09:38:16]
Lisa Marie
 in some ways you do both because they've there's got to be something they focus on so that they know, right, so they can take care of the bills because then they're just going to keep piling on. Right. And you also work with them, I'm assuming to help change their mindset, right?

[01:09:40:08 - 01:09:51:09]
Rachel Burns
 Yeah, I'm not I'm not a coach. I'm not a mindset person. I am. I'm a financial planner. I'm a certified financial planner. However, there's a lot of mindset woven into it. And I do.

[01:09:52:15 - 01:10:09:16]
Rachel Burns
 Right. Kind of indirectly address that. And so like when I'm meeting with someone, I'm very gentle. I'm very supportive. And I'm like, look, how you're feeling right now is completely understandable. You're not always going to feel this way. We're going to get through this. It's going to get a lot easier.

[01:10:10:17 - 01:10:23:09]
Rachel Burns
 So I do try to address the mindset stuff. And sometimes sometimes, you know, I think, OK, we're going to get we're going to get together and we're going to make this financial plan. But they do get stuck in.

[01:10:24:13 - 01:10:27:02]
Rachel Burns
 In ruts sometimes where

[01:10:28:04 - 01:10:36:00]
Rachel Burns
 there's there's clearly something more going on and it's more of an emotional thing. And so that does get.

[01:10:37:03 - 01:10:40:20]
Rachel Burns
 You know, that does impact some of the work that I do with them. But,

[01:10:42:07 - 01:10:52:22]
Rachel Burns
 you know, I start the first thing that I typically do is we we figure out what the goals are, because before I even want to start digging into their statements and their.

[01:10:54:06 - 01:11:34:13]
Rachel Burns
 Taxes and all that stuff. I know I know what those are. What are we trying to accomplish? What are the problems that you're trying to solve? What's the point of what's the point of all this? What's you know, what do you want? And that gives me an idea of what exactly I need to help them with. And so once we once we get really clear on the goals are then I start gathering the data because I don't want to spend a whole bunch of time gathering tons and tons of data on something that doesn't matter to them. It may be some some things matter to me that don't matter to them. Sometimes I need to ask for that. But like I want to know what's important before I start asking them a gazillion details.

[01:11:35:14 - 01:12:11:02]
Lisa Marie
 Oh, yeah, absolutely. Because goals are important, right? I tell my clients and I tell my listeners all the time that, you know, when you're doing this, when you're dealing with your money, when you're looking at your numbers, when you're having your business, it's important that all of of of the things, the financial plan, the money roadmap, all of those things that you put into place are aligned with your goals, your desires, and your goals. Your desires and your values. And the reason why is because if it's not, it's not going to work. Period. And.

[01:12:12:14 - 01:12:20:00]
Lisa Marie
 It you're because you're going to feel restrictive or are mad or angry.

[01:12:22:04 - 01:12:23:21]
Lisa Marie
 Angry that.

[01:12:26:11 - 01:12:26:16]
Lisa Marie
 The.

[01:12:28:19 - 01:12:34:00]
Lisa Marie
 It's not aligned, right? That that that is restrictive, that it's that it's

[01:12:35:13 - 01:12:38:22]
Lisa Marie
 not something you want. So I think it's really important.

[01:12:40:01 - 01:13:12:19]
Lisa Marie
 That made me really happy when you said this, the first thing you ask is their goals, because that's what I ask. I'm like, OK, what are your goals? What are your desires? And they're like, why are you asking me this? Because it matters. And they're like, yeah. And I'm like, and they're like, what? You mean my meeting? No, I want I want the big, audacious goals. I want, you know, because a lot of times those big audacious goals are actually achievable. We just don't think they are because we think they're big audacious and we've got something in our head telling us they're not. And then you have me or you have Rachel or you have one of my best friends who's also a sort of financial planner.

[01:13:14:00 - 01:13:17:08]
Lisa Marie
 And you're able to have someone sit with you and help you

[01:13:18:18 - 01:13:23:20]
Lisa Marie
 show you that those big audacious goals are available. And, you know,

[01:13:25:04 - 01:14:04:11]
Lisa Marie
 them being y'all being financial planners, y'all were able to do a little bit more delving with the tax returns and plan like, you know, long future and as far as like the different things. And I'm able to help put together a roadmap that helps you be able to see, OK, this is where I can I can allocate money for this. I can allocate money for that. I can do that and get you to a certain point. And then the financial planners are able to do more. And I say that because, again, I am not a financial planner. I don't pretend to be. And I have no qualms about telling people, nope, that's out of my wheelhouse. I can refer you to here, here or here.

[01:14:05:17 - 01:15:00:00]
Lisa Marie
 And I do. I have a referral, you know. But it's important to realize that when you have those goals and tell if you tell us, especially I mean, I'll tell them I want your goals. I want big. I want them small, medium, big audacious. I want them all. But when you tell us that a lot of times I'm analytical. So that's the reason why I can look at a spreadsheet and I can see the money. People joke at me. It's like I can I can go look at the money in their bank account and I see their goals and I see I have their expenses and they're like, she makes magic happen because I can say, OK, this is you can allocate this here, here and here. And now you can you keep doing this as long as this stays the same. Then you're good. This is where you put it and you'll be able to reach this by this amount of time. And, you know, that's where the CFO comes in because I'm a CFO. And a wealth coach. And so I'm able to intertwine the two to help them be able to.

[01:15:01:03 - 01:15:05:08]
Lisa Marie
 My goal is to help them be able to grow their business to where they're thriving and not just surviving.

[01:15:06:19 - 01:15:26:18]
Lisa Marie
 I say all the time, I want to help women be able to stand on their own two feet, whether they need to or not, because then later in life, when they need to, you know, they've never had they they don't know anything about it. Right. Now, all of a sudden, they're having to stand on their own two feet. And they're like, oh, shit, you know, you can't go run and bury your head in the sand then because it's just you.

[01:15:27:21 - 01:15:31:06]
Lisa Marie
 And it's scary. I know firsthand. It's very scary.

[01:15:32:13 - 01:15:36:03]
Lisa Marie
 One of the other things that you that you put on the questionnaire and

[01:15:38:21 - 01:15:46:01]
Lisa Marie
 I found you and I are alike in this area is that in 2008, when the market crashed, the housing market crashed,

[01:15:47:21 - 01:15:49:05]
Lisa Marie
 you had to do a foreclosure.

[01:15:50:09 - 01:16:06:06]
Lisa Marie
 And in 2008, when the fiber when the housing market crashed, I had just built my house and had a condo that was that was being sold. And unbeknownst to me, it was

[01:16:08:21 - 01:16:10:20]
Lisa Marie
 appraised for more than apparently.

[01:16:12:08 - 01:16:16:00]
Lisa Marie
 And I don't know if it's appraised for more than what it was worth, but because they.

[01:16:17:19 - 01:16:18:18]
Lisa Marie
 Snaff food, so many.

[01:16:20:10 - 01:16:33:06]
Lisa Marie
 That when it was reappraised, when the market crashed, it was now not appraised for as much in this this amount of money that I had or the I the money that I had. Oh, crap. What's it called?

[01:16:34:22 - 01:16:48:19]
Lisa Marie
 OK, see, I have a brain fart. We all live in moment. Yes, thank you. I go sit here going. I know the word, but I couldn't think of it. I had so much equity built up in it. And the person had been approved for the house. Right.

[01:16:49:20 - 01:17:01:08]
Lisa Marie
 And this just shows you what happened is when the housing market crashed, she no longer qualified for the condo and then the condo no longer appraised for what they originally praised it for. Now.

[01:17:02:22 - 01:17:27:19]
Lisa Marie
 That's because people were being approved that shouldn't have been approved. And that's because they were appraising houses and condos or whatever at much higher things. And so when the market crashed, all of a sudden, the things that were worth so much at one point were now not worth nearly as much. So at one point in time, I probably did have equity in the condo, but because the housing market crashed, that equity disappeared. Like literally, y'all. I mean, it went poof.

[01:17:29:01 - 01:17:37:23]
Lisa Marie
 You talk about money disappearing. That money was gone. It was like no longer there or anything. And we end up I end up having to do a short sell on it.

[01:17:39:09 - 01:17:44:19]
Lisa Marie
 So I wouldn't have to foreclose, but I found myself instead of being ahead in the house that I had at that time,

[01:17:45:22 - 01:18:07:11]
Lisa Marie
 being behind. And, you know, you mentioned and this is really important. That's why I'm going to say it's I'm you learned a lot of lessons and it took you several years to move past that because I'm sure there was even though it was out of your control, most of the things, most of the things were out of my control. There were some things that were out of my control and there were some things that weren't.

[01:18:09:20 - 01:18:14:00]
Lisa Marie
 Moving past that shame and then realizing that

[01:18:15:04 - 01:18:22:02]
Lisa Marie
 you may have overleveraged yourself and to begin with, right? Or you may have took some uncalculated risks.

[01:18:23:02 - 01:18:39:16]
Lisa Marie
 What are some of the things that you've learned from that, like that you would pass on to the listeners or to your clients or to, you know, to anybody, you know, who is is may be in that position at some point? You know, I mean, to to understand that.

[01:18:41:04 - 01:18:54:12]
Lisa Marie
 Debt is OK, to a certain extent. I tell people this all the time. There's bad. There's there's not all debt is bad. There's good and bad. And a lot of times when it's bad is when we're overleveraging ourselves and we're not being strategic and and knowing what what we're doing.

[01:18:58:02 - 01:19:02:01]
Rachel Burns
 So your question is what I what what I would tell people, what lessons?

[01:19:03:02 - 01:19:07:12]
Lisa Marie
 Yeah, like what are some what are some of the lessons that you learned from it? Yeah.

[01:19:07:12 - 01:19:08:08]
Rachel Burns
 So

[01:19:10:06 - 01:19:11:13]
Rachel Burns
 there there's a couple.

[01:19:12:14 - 01:19:35:06]
Rachel Burns
 There's a couple sides to that. One is there was a lot that was beyond my control. I I obviously couldn't control what's happening in the in the real estate market and the stock market and all that stuff. But I absolutely. But I have to take a lot of responsibility there because I made some decisions that weren't great that put myself in a position where

[01:19:37:13 - 01:20:07:16]
Rachel Burns
 that happened. And I I am responsible for that. Like that was avoidable. And that was a learning experience. But that was a learning experience. That was not a life defining thing. That's not like, oh, I am this person because I made this mistake. I bought that house when I was 22 years old. Like that was a problem in itself. I had not the maturity needed to be a homeowner and to make decisions with large amounts of money. And so.

[01:20:08:20 - 01:20:10:09]
Rachel Burns
 That I'm like, OK,

[01:20:12:00 - 01:20:25:15]
Rachel Burns
 I made a mistake. I learned from it. That's not going to happen again. I've you know, but at the same time, like, I don't need to beat myself up forever and ever about that. That's not.

[01:20:26:19 - 01:21:09:09]
Rachel Burns
 That happened to a lot of people during that time. And even if it wasn't during that time, the foreclosures happen to people for various reasons. And it's not that doesn't have anything to do with who you are as a person. And that doesn't mean you're doomed to like doing dumb stuff in the future. So I did feel bad about it. I felt embarrassed mostly because I was in I was a financial advisor. You know, I was I was a brand new one at the time. But like I was in that industry and I'm like, this is really embarrassing that someone's financial advisor has a foreclosure on their record. Like that was really embarrassing to me from like a career perspective.

[01:21:10:09 - 01:21:15:11]
Rachel Burns
 But like I was like, I it's I just got to get over that. That's

[01:21:17:02 - 01:21:38:03]
Rachel Burns
 I'm not that doesn't change who I am. And so I did get over it. And now I don't care. And now I'm like, all right, that it happens. It happens. Stuff happens to all of us. We all make mistakes. We all experience things where things happen to us that are beyond our control. And things happen as a result of our actions. And we just do our best and we learn and we move on.

[01:21:41:02 - 01:21:46:18]
Lisa Marie
 Yeah, exactly. You know, I mean, I'm I'm going to tell my listeners on my website, tell my clients all the time.

[01:21:47:19 - 01:21:51:06]
Lisa Marie
 There's nothing anyone can tell me that will surprise me, shock me or go

[01:21:52:07 - 01:22:05:04]
Lisa Marie
 because I'll be 51 in July. And I've been through two foreclosures, a short sale and a chapter seven bankruptcy. I have rebuilt my credit.

[01:22:06:15 - 01:22:07:18]
Lisa Marie
 This last time is four times

[01:22:09:00 - 01:22:18:17]
Lisa Marie
 in my from adulthood, from the 20s to the 50s, so in the last 30 years. OK, and and I don't laugh about it saying, haha, it's funny.

[01:22:19:17 - 01:22:26:19]
Lisa Marie
 I used to beat myself up because I was newly married and the fiber optic market crashed.

[01:22:27:23 - 01:22:39:00]
Lisa Marie
 And again, that's out of our control. Right. So when the fiber optic market crashed, he lost his job. We went from ninety thousand dollars to 18 like that.

[01:22:40:02 - 01:22:51:01]
Lisa Marie
 The house, the brand new truck, the stuff that we had as newlyweds that we went out and bought and financed and put all this money. We had no business doing right after we got married. Right. And.

[01:22:53:17 - 01:23:06:04]
Lisa Marie
 And it was embarrassing because I'm good. I'm good with numbers and I can't make 18 turn into 90. It just doesn't work. So when we lost all that income and.

[01:23:08:00 - 01:23:10:18]
Lisa Marie
 The there was no choice and.

[01:23:13:03 - 01:23:26:14]
Lisa Marie
 We made uncalculated risk, not paying attention to where what we were doing, a brand new truck, a brand new house. We didn't need a brand new truck and a brand new house at the same time. We should have waited. We had one vehicle. We could have made it work.

[01:23:27:21 - 01:23:50:02]
Lisa Marie
 But again, we were young and we weren't you know, we were 25, 26, not the not being the smartest in the world. Right. And so the chapter seven bankruptcy was it was just the way it was. And that, of course, the house doesn't go in the bankruptcy. That goes into the foreclosure. And, you know, I learned from it. And later on, the housing market crashed. And.

[01:23:51:07 - 01:24:06:08]
Lisa Marie
 I thought I had learned from it, but apparently I hadn't because I had taken I all of a sudden qualified for all kinds of stuff. OK, all kinds of credit. So I was able to get my new washing machine and dry all these things. And I shouldn't have done all of that at one time.

[01:24:09:05 - 01:24:09:18]
Lisa Marie
 Now.

[01:24:11:14 - 01:24:12:16]
Lisa Marie
 I'm a lot.

[01:24:14:07 - 01:24:36:16]
Lisa Marie
 Smarter, a lot more strategic. And the whole point to that is, yes, life happens. Sometimes we make the wrong mistakes. Sometimes we make decisions based off the information we have at the time that if we didn't know more information, we wouldn't have made. But that doesn't mean that's who we are. I'm not a person who's always going to always going to

[01:24:37:23 - 01:25:17:10]
Lisa Marie
 file bankruptcy or foreclosure or never own a house or any of those things. It's something that happened. And I say that because if I can go from all of that. And then later in life have to be on food stamps and get off of food stamps to make in six figures, not coming from any money, then anybody can do it because it's all in that mindset and knowing what the world is going on with your money and being smart about the debt that you're doing and being strategic, especially in your business and personal. And so the reason why I brought that up was because, you know,

[01:25:19:04 - 01:25:31:12]
Lisa Marie
 you were saying don't over leverage yourself, right? And that's something I think we don't think of in the moment when we're doing those things. I know I didn't. And now when I go to make big

[01:25:32:14 - 01:26:18:19]
Lisa Marie
 investments or big spending decisions like a washing machine or dryer or freezer, I literally sit back, go and look at the numbers, look at everything, go shop. And I analyze it. I do. And I give myself at least 24 hours before I make the decision and I make sure I have the pros and cons of two different ways to, you know, to go so that I'm making a strategic and best decision possible. And I'm not just jumping in. And I think that that's important because a lot of times we just snap our fingers, make the decision and we don't look at, OK, am I over leveraging myself? Is this going to cause an issue or do I have the money here that I can use those kind of things? Right.

[01:26:19:22 - 01:26:28:03]
Lisa Marie
 Do you talk to your clients about how to put money up into savings and to, you know, to plan for the things that they want? I mean, as a financial planner, I'm sure you do.

[01:26:29:10 - 01:26:37:00]
Lisa Marie
 But especially as in being newly single, I'm sure that that's something, you know, they're like, you know, I want to be able to do this or I want to be able to do that.

[01:26:38:13 - 01:26:41:16]
Lisa Marie
 You work with them to fit that into their plan, right? I mean.

[01:26:41:16 - 01:26:59:01]
Rachel Burns
 Yeah, there's no there's no money that's unaccounted for. There's, you know, we set aside the emergency fund. That's step one. Then, you know, we set aside the savings for the other kind of sort of short term goals.

[01:27:00:07 - 01:27:05:12]
Rachel Burns
 And then we have savings for retirement and.

[01:27:06:18 - 01:27:08:00]
Rachel Burns
 Whatever money is not

[01:27:09:09 - 01:27:13:17]
Rachel Burns
 sucked up by one of those categories, that's your discretionary spending.

[01:27:16:00 - 01:27:16:05]
Rachel Burns
 And.

[01:27:17:08 - 01:27:27:11]
Rachel Burns
 I don't I don't get like super into the budgeting and the savings, because usually when someone works with me, they already have that.

[01:27:29:21 - 01:27:32:22]
Rachel Burns
 But they don't know they don't necessarily know what to do with it.

[01:27:34:10 - 01:27:44:17]
Rachel Burns
 You know, they just even if someone has a lot of money, that doesn't mean that they're immune from bad habits or bad decisions. And so rather than just like.

[01:27:46:03 - 01:28:14:02]
Rachel Burns
 You know, I use my debit card and I and it's attached to something and I haven't really looked back to see how much money is in there or what how long it's going to last. I mean, I help them figure out. OK, if you're spending at this rate, this is how long that lasts. And then we we need to have a plan for. Right. Where else the money comes from after that or like it's just looking at the big picture because it's really easy to get very focused on the day to day.

[01:28:15:07 - 01:28:38:23]
Rachel Burns
 I am, you know, I'm just using my debit card or I'm buying stuff online or I'm making these these kind of smaller financial decisions that end up adding up to something big. And if there's no context, if you're not thinking about your overall finances and your overall goals, then you're just throwing darts. Like it's just there. It's like kind of aimless.

[01:28:41:14 - 01:30:40:21]
Lisa Marie
 Yeah, well, I mean, and similar, you know, I work with them to create a money roadmap, which is it's another word for budget, but it's all in compass. So it's it's it's their values and their goals. There's yearly expenses, the monthly. And one of the first things that I'll do is a D. I have them. I have them do because I want them to become aware of them swiping that debit card or credit card. They'll do a deep dive on three months of their statements. And I have them separated into categories. I cannot tell you how many times someone will come back going, oh, my God, I didn't know I was spending that much money. Has Starbucks or Alti or whatever it is. Normally Starbucks or Alti meals. And, you know, and they'll come and go. And I'm like, it's because you just said you were swiping that card and they're like, and you made me why did you make me look at us? Because now it's here. Because if I had done it and just gave you a total wouldn't be here. You saw it because I tell them you have to print it out. Waste paper. Yes, I'm asking you to kill a tree. I do not want you to highlight it on computer. I want you to print it out hand in paper because it it's it does something and not being on the computer. You're looking at it on paper printed. It's it does something. I don't know why, but it does. So and actually highlighting and looking at it and then adding it up. And that's when I go, OK, you're spending this much money here at Starbucks or out to eat. Is that what you want to spend monthly? No. OK, how much do you want to spend? And they'll say a number and then go, but I don't know how. Well, I'm going to explain to you how we can do that. Instead of you going to Starbucks seven days a week, go to Starbucks four days. OK, because they'll say, oh, I'm just going to stop going. No. And they're like, why? I'm like, because you're not going to stick to that. You've been going seven days a week for however, how many years? You're not going to just automatically stop going. That's like a restrictive fad diet and they don't work.

[01:30:42:04 - 01:31:02:00]
Lisa Marie
 They just they don't. So cut it back instead, you know, and you can cut it back to four days and then eventually cut it back some more if you want. Great. But you my clients are amazed at how much money they save when they cut three days. If they've been going seven and they cut three days out, they're like flabbergasted.

[01:31:03:09 - 01:31:48:02]
Lisa Marie
 And I'm like, OK, and now, you know, this thing that you wanted that you said you couldn't afford, you can put this money here. Or you know, that thing that you said that you didn't understand how you were going to pay for it or how you were going to put money in retirement. OK, well, here's part of it. Let's see what else we can find, you know, because a lot of times we have what I call money leaks and it's like you're saying, you're swiping the card and you're not thinking about it. And you don't look back to see how much. And it's those little amounts, right? I mean, the five dollars, the ten dollars here. And I don't know about anybody else, but lately, who has been able to go and get food anywhere for lunch for less than ten to twelve dollars?

[01:31:49:16 - 01:31:56:09]
Lisa Marie
 Every single time. Yeah. So you ten dollars times five days. That's fifty dollars a week.

[01:31:58:12 - 01:32:02:16]
Lisa Marie
 You do the math on how much that is a month, and we'll see how many listeners go. Oh, my gosh.

[01:32:04:02 - 01:32:22:10]
Lisa Marie
 Like because, you know, and so when we make it in the forefront of their brain, that's when, like you said, then becoming knowledgeable. Now we can take some of this and plan towards those longer term goals. And I think that's truly important. I love what you do and I love the fact that you work with women

[01:32:24:04 - 01:33:07:11]
Lisa Marie
 who have found themselves newly single and they don't know how to stand on their own two feet because that's what my passion is, because I think it's just so important for us to be able to society doesn't really help that help us in that area very much. And it's the reason why I started my podcast, because I'm tired of money being such a taboo subject. And so I think it's really, really important. And I want my sassy listeners to get out of this, that no matter what your circumstances are, no matter what is happening or going on, you are not that. It's just something that happened. And if it happened yesterday or last week or last month, then just like Rachel said, OK, it happened.

[01:33:08:20 - 01:33:19:06]
Lisa Marie
 It doesn't define you. It happened. It was a lesson. Learn from it. What can you do today to move you this way to not this way, not always before?

[01:33:21:07 - 01:33:32:06]
Lisa Marie
 Instead of, you know, looking behind you. And I think that's just that's just really, really important in today's age. Rachel, you have a free offer for the listeners and will you please tell them what that is?

[01:33:33:12 - 01:33:43:22]
Rachel Burns
 Yeah, so I have a e-book that is five things that newly single women should do first with their finances.

[01:33:45:00 - 01:33:50:23]
Rachel Burns
 And it's a quick it's a quick read. It's simple, just simple things you can do that will get you on the right track.

[01:33:50:23 - 01:34:05:22]
Lisa Marie
 Oh, I love it. I think that's really important. And we will make sure that the link is in the show notes. Thank you so much, Rachel, for being on my show today. I appreciate it. And my sassy friend, until next time, remember to stay sassy. Bye.

[01:34:05:22 - 01:34:37:21]
Lisa Marie
 Thanks for joining us this week on Cash in SaaS. Check us out on social media and on our website at www.transcendentwealthcode.com where you can download my free Money Story Start Guide. The website again is www.transcendentwealthcode.com. And as always, subscribe to the show to catch every new episode and leave us a review so we can continue to bring you fresh content. And remember, yes, it is possible to have sassy and sexy money. See you next week!