Episode 413: Financial Freedom & Love: The Key to Aligning Money & Relationships with Jessica & Brandon Norwood

Jessica Norwood 0:02

When you put the context around their emotions and their feelings and their background with money and finances, that will help you understand why they are the way they are, and that is what you need in order to execute on those goals, it

Brandon Norwood 0:16

also allows you to provide empathy, as far as you actually saying, why your partner doing certain things, but then also looking at the good things that they're doing and continuing those and celebrating those T

Jamila Souffrant 0:28

minus 10 seconds. Welcome to the journey. To launch podcast with your host Jamila Souffrant as a money expert who walks her talk, she helps brave journeyers like you get out of debt, save, invest and build real wealth. Join her on the journey to launch to financial freedom in 54321,

if you want the episode show notes for this episode, go to journey to launch.com or click the description of wherever you're listening to this episode in the show notes, you'll get the transcribed version of the conversation, the links that we mentioned, and so much more also, whether you are an OG journeyer or brand new to the podcast, I've created a free jump start guide to help you on your financial freedom journey. It includes the top episodes to listen to, stages to go through to reach financial freedom resources and so much more you can go to journey to launch.com/jump start to get your guide right now. Okay, let's hop into the episode. Hey, hey, hey, journeyers, welcome to the journey to launch podcast this week I have on Jessica and Brandon Norwood, who are the dynamic duo behind the sugar daddy podcast, a financial literacy podcast dedicated to helping Millennials build wealth and break down the stigma around money. Conversations as a married elder millennial couple, I love that word, elder millennial. Their mission is to empower you to take control of your finances so you can live the life you've always dreamed of. Welcome to the podcast, Jessica and Brandon. Thank you so much for having us, for having us. Yeah, I'm excited. And Brandon was before we press record. Was showing me how to work my recording system that we both use, and I always like to tell people, This is why I say you can do anything you want to, because people think that I've been doing this podcast for so long that I have it all together, and my setup is so basic and hot mess. And look, look at me. I'll make it work so you can too.

Jessica Norwood 2:32

You really are progress, not perfection, right?

Jamila Souffrant 2:38

Exactly, exactly. Okay. So I always like to start kind of bit from the beginning. I mean, I know you guys now are established with your podcast and branding, still growing and talking about money together, but I want to take it back to almost your individual origin stories, not to stay there too long, but just then how you both were raised, in terms of money, where you're from, and then meeting, and then we could go from there.

Jessica Norwood 3:02

Yeah, I'll start. So I grew up in Germany. My mom's German, my dad's black, he's from Florida. But we grew up in Germany, in Bavaria, until I was 10, and so kind of had that culture shock of coming over at 10, starting fifth grade in the US, and have been here ever since growing up, my dad was the primary breadwinner and my mom managed all the money, and so that was the dynamic that I grew up with. And then in my late 20s, my parents, after 35 years of marriage, ended up getting a divorce, and I kind of started seeing what that does to a family. And now my mom, who was planning on being retired at this age, is still working so that she has health care. And, you know, those are just things that I'm starting to see more and more of, and that I very quickly realized, like I want to avoid, that. I do not want to be in that kind of a position. So I kind of took that and ran with it in the sense that I wanted to always make my own money, be financially secure and independent, regardless of being married or not married, like I will have a hand in making my money, managing the money and growing my money. And so that's the high level. I mean, we can dig into into the details there, but that's kind of that origin story.

Jamila Souffrant 4:20

Love that. And you. Brandon,

Brandon Norwood 4:22

so my parents actually got divorced when I was five, and my mom raised my brother and I, and my dad really wasn't around when I was younger, so it was mainly my mom, obviously. And I was fortunate enough though, that in that scenario where often money tends to be an issue, my mom was a college professor. She did very well for herself. Money was never an issue. She had a financial advisor at a young, you know, when I was a child, great at budgeting money, so it's never really an issue. And also, you know, growing up with my mom obviously being the one taking care of us, I was accustomed to, you know, an educated woman that's, you know, taking care of everything, as far as the money you. Everything of that nature. So when Justin I got together, that wasn't necessarily something that was new to me, as far as being with a strong woman, because that's kind of what I've always experienced. And you know, money was talked about in our house to a certain extent, but I wouldn't say to the extent that we talk about money in our household.

Jamila Souffrant 5:17

Okay, so one thing I didn't mention Brandon, is that you are a licensed financial planner with an over a decade of experience, and so I think your dynamic with Jessica, who in your bio says you're actually the sugar daddy, which I want to get into. I think it's I just want to add that context, just because I think there's that like validity and like that technical side that you have the license behind talking about finance in a way that some of us in the personal finance space just don't have, because we don't have that designation. And then going back to your comment, so you said something, and then my wheels started turning, because I do want to explore this a bit, because we're talking about relationships and money, and in the kind of traditional I guess. You know relationship like it's also not uncommon for me, and in our my marriage, that I am the person who is leading the charge when it comes to money and conversations about money. And my husband, from what I mean, we've been together for a long time, I don't think he has a problem with it. He's happy to let me take the reins. And I went back to thinking about how he was raised, because you mentioned having a strong mother that you seem to you know, respect and love. And I think for him, he was his mother was also the force in the household, and think they have a good relationship. He I don't think he resented her for that, and I think that carried over to his adult relationship and him being comfortable and not feeling emasculated, that I'm the one that's more on it when it comes to money. So I wonder if you have thoughts on that. Because sometimes I think in our society, or in our world nowadays, I'll look at stories or people that say, Oh, they're like, the man should be making the decisions. Or men don't like to feel emasculated, and they want to like be the head of the household, which I think, you know, you can be the head of household. That's fine. We could both, like, kind of rule together. But what do you think about that? Do you see like a tie in between, like the couples that you talk to, or the people that follow you, in terms of when a man is not comfortable with the woman being more just aggressive or dominant, more confident in finances versus not? And their upbringing with their mother? Well,

Brandon Norwood 7:20

I would say for me, my clients are probably not the norm, because they tend to kind of mirror myself and Jess. So I would say that most of the time it's actually the woman that's kind of reaching out to me to initiate the planning relationship. And then I would also say that they kind of lead the conversations in regards to some of the decisions being made. Now both are present. But I would definitely say that. I would say women, as far as my client basis, kind of lead the push now. I think things are changing in the sense of, I think for the longest time, men were told that the only way that they really, you know, they bring something to the table for their family is by providing monetarily, monetarily, providing monetarily, I think that was what we've always been told. And that is changing. Because one just the dynamics of the relationships, as far as money in the household is changing, but then also the reality is that things cost significantly more, so you kind of do need two incomes nowadays in order for most people to get by. So that dynamic does change. And I think men really need to understand that there's a lot more things that they can bring to the table, rather than just money itself. Yeah,

Jamila Souffrant 8:29

I'm thinking back to also some of the social media posts, or just the younger kids nowadays, and when they're talking about dating and money and the things that they will require from a man like that, you know, they pay for everything. And I'm just like, how like, to me, that's not realistic unless your partner, the man, is, like, making hundreds or millions of like, dollars. But like, the average person like you're not unless, unless we're talking about, like, the very prudent and frugal lifestyle is not going to be able to carry like you, like another person and kids, yeah. So I just, I'm always like, Wait, that's this. That's not reality. I

Brandon Norwood 9:04

will put this like little caveat, though. I think if that's what you want, and you find a partner that wants that also, then that's great, because the one thing that we do is that we never tell people how their relationship should be. It's just a matter of that they're you and your partner should be on the same page as far as how your relationship is going to move forward.

Jessica Norwood 9:22

But I haven't. I actually have an issue with that, and we've done an episode on it, because if you want the actual sugar daddy, right? If you want to be at home, work out, maintain the home, cook dinners, and that's your job, you know, I don't want to diminish that in any way. You know, stay at home moms, that is the hardest job on the planet. Now, if you're a stay at home girlfriend and there's no kids, I'm giving you the side eye, but what I do want to say and call out is that if that dynamic works for you, you should still put things in place to help secure your retirement. Because what happens if you're in that relationship, and I'm just going to you. Know, make a kind of blanket statement, if you're the one being cared for, right? And you're keeping up appearances, and you're that trophy girlfriend, trophy wife, at some point, are you going to get traded in for a younger model? And then what? You have no skills, you have no work history. Do you have a retirement Do you have a savings account? What does your money look like, and then are you going to be, you know, maybe forced, in a sense of getting into another relationship just so somebody else can take care of you because you weren't willing to take care of yourself. So I do think as women, we have a responsibility to ourselves to make sure that our money is right, our bank account looks the way it needs to, so that we can leave a negative situation, whether it's a negative, toxic workplace or a negative, toxic relationship or a dangerous relationship, if you cannot do that on your own because you are relying on a man that is not a good position to be in,

Jamila Souffrant 10:53

yeah, and unless you have a very evolved partner, and I mean, you know that can mean a bunch of things. That is the breadwinner and is bringing home most of the money, they more than likely, then have more of a say in how things go, unless they are going to be really fair and recognize the value that you bring. Because, like you said, there are a lot of things that someone can bring to the table, other than money that is important to help a household run, but I just think that a lot of times that's not the case for a lot of people, depending on the ages you meet and how just their experiences past experiences, but I do want to talk a little bit about you merging and coming together. Did you guys have any issues starting because Jessica, I would love to kind of go into your background a bit, because I know you all you worked in corporate America, and was it easy to get on sync because of your different backgrounds, because I know some couples, it's not it's not easy. It's like it's a struggle to get to the same page. Yeah,

Jessica Norwood 11:48

absolutely. So when we first started dating, I was actually in teaching, so our salaries were probably very equal, all things considered. And then when I moved and we got married, I switched into the tech sector, which is where I still am. So I do still work full time corporate, girly, you know, I like my 401, K and my match and all those things. It also gives us health insurance. I know that's something you talk a lot about with your husband, like, you know, there's something about being an entrepreneur that's really intriguing, but it's also very expensive in some areas. And so by me still being in that corporate life, we have insurance for the family and those things. So once I transition into tech, is when my salary, you know, doubled, tripled, etc, and then that's when that dynamic, it was nice for the house, right? Like we're taking more vacations, we're doing more home upgrades, things like that. But we were in our late 20s, early 30s, when we got married, and so we owned homes. We had been paying our bills for a long time. We were really merged. We're merging two full and very complete lives. And so we had the conversation, you know, I ended up selling one of my homes, moved into his house, and I basically said, listen, what's the deal? Because if I'm paying rent, right, that's going towards your mortgage. I have no equity in this. What happens when we sell what happens to this furniture I'm bringing in? What's the expectation for home improvements? I think, because we're both products of divorce, him at a young age and me in my adulthood, we had these tough conversations very early. And he knew how I felt. He knew what was going on with my parents. He knew the financial constraints that my mom was going to be in because of the divorce. And so when I came to him and I said, Listen, I'm just not going to pay your mortgage and not get anything for it, if this relationship doesn't work, and I've been pouring into your mortgage, what's that going to look like for me? Right? And so we had those conversations early and often, and he knew, because of my background, exactly where I was coming from. So we we tackled those tough things very head on and very early.

Jamila Souffrant 13:57

All right. Well, now we need to know what was the decision like, how did you, how did you make yourself feel equal? Or was the, what did you come to in that? Well, I

Brandon Norwood 14:07

would say the first so, I would say taking a step back, the first thing that I did since she was, you know, uprooting her life, per se, in Columbus, South Carolina, and then moving into, you know, the townhouse that I owned. I let her do whatever she wanted to do, as far as decorating, full full redo, full redo, as far as you know, making it feel as though it was ours and not mine, and she's coming in and living there so it, you know, if you walked into the house, you know, when I was a single guy, in comparison to when she moved in, it was night and day. So I think that was a the first step that, you know, made her feel more as this is our home, and not just my home. Yeah,

Jessica Norwood 14:43

that was big. We did talk about the financial implications. You know, if, if the relationship wouldn't have progressed the way it did, you know, what does that look like? Is there a percentage that I would get back? Is there money that you would pay me for painting all these horrible red and brown COVID. Dollars that were painted on these walls. You know, I brought in new furniture. We sold the old furniture, and so, you know, I won't say that we had a ledger or an Excel spreadsheet of this is the money I put in and and that. But I do think that people should and could do that, right? You have a monetary contribution that you're making to, technically, somebody else's home. So having some sort of an agreement in place of, what does this look like if you sell? What does it look like if we sell? Is there some sort of an agreement of, hey, the relationship's not working out. How long before I need to move out? Right? Are you just going to kick me out? I'm going to be on the street. Do I have 30 days? Do I have 60 days? I can move into the spare bedroom, and it can be awkward for a little bit. Whatever those rules are that you want to put in place. That's up to you and your partner, but talk about it and figure it out, because there are instances where you're pouring into somebody else's home. You're not on the mortgage, you're not on the deed, you have no stake in that property. They turn around and sell it for a profit, and you're not making a dime. So whatever you decide, you make the rules, but talk about it and put something in place. Because you can have, like, a renter's agreement, even between, you know, if you're not married and, you know, get it notarized. Have somebody sign it, have an attorney look over it, because you want to have some sort of protection again, especially as the woman in like a heteronormative relationship, granted,

Brandon Norwood 16:24

she also made it very well known the approximate time frame that we would be dating before she was expecting a ring. And I think I missed it by 10 days only because I was waiting for the ring to come.

Jessica Norwood 16:35

So it's not like an ultimatum

Brandon Norwood 16:40

in 10 days. Yeah, I

Jamila Souffrant 16:42

love that. That's like, mindset of a woman who knows, like, what she wants and her worth. And I just feel like, hopefully, I, you know, I have, you know, whether it's friends or siblings and people in my life that are currently kind of dating and figuring things out themselves, they always tell me, like, I don't know what it's like, because I've been married so and I don't know, you know, like, I'm not in a dating world right now, but I just love this idea of being, like, confident and rooted, like, into who you are. And this goes for the man or woman, and what you expect and not it doesn't have to be like a sit down business, like you are telling the person what to do, but you're just saying, here are my expectations. Here is some things that are concerning me. How are we going to talk about this? And I think a very good indicator on if this is a partner that is worthy of you is, is how they respond to you. Just bringing things up that are logical, like this is something I should be asking questions about. So I don't we should have the conversation about this. We

Brandon Norwood 17:34

had something very interesting. We kind of like came to agreement on a couple weeks ago, was that people always say love should be unconditional, and we say love between you and your spouse is conditional, 100% conditional upon them treating you the way that you should be treated. Yeah, for me to love you

Jessica Norwood 17:51

now my children, that's a that's a different kind of love, right? But I married you under you know, the condition that you treat me with respect. You value me. You You know, I am your priority, etc, so if that changes, if there's a shift, then, yeah, that love's gonna go away. So, I mean, I get the sentiment behind love is unconditional, but it is not.

Jamila Souffrant 18:14

It's unconditional in terms of the non priority or the things that you can compromise on, right? Like, certain things where it's like, okay, you know, maybe physical appearance changes because you had a kid, or just just, there are things to me that, yes, like, we're gonna compromise on that, or I'm gonna let that go, just because we are evolving together over the years, like that, yes, but like you said, the foundational things, like being able to trust you, and ultimately, we may not always get it right and how we like communicate, or what we're saying, but that I know you respect me, like, the foundational stuff to meet that, like, there is, like you said, I don't like, there's no compromise on that. Like, what are we doing? And

Jessica Norwood 18:57

those are the things we talked about earlier, too. Like that, black and white. These are the areas where there's no gray matter for us, right? And they were very similar for both of us. But again, we really talked about them, detailed them, and then talked about what our expectations are, too, in the event that, hey, what if you kept yourself in this kind of a situation? What would you do if we did a lot of hypotheticals, right? Or here's what I would expect you to do in this situation. If something happened, you know, and I didn't like how that played out, I would say, hey, if this happens again, here's how I would expect you to handle it the next time. And so just keeping those lines of communication open at all times to ensure you know that again, you feel respected in the relationship, you feel safe in the relationship, you feel honored. Those are things that are really important to us. So

Jamila Souffrant 19:46

Jessica, one thing you mentioned in your origin story was that you were a teacher, and then you switched to tech, which increased your income by a lot. And I want to talk about that, because I think your transition and tips you can give. From how that happened, would be very helpful

Jessica Norwood 20:01

for people? Yeah, absolutely. So we have a full episode on how to transition out of teaching, because I think it's such an important topic, and people ask me all the time, and I've helped friends transition out of teaching as well, but I think one of the main things to do is to start networking early and often. As a former teacher, you stay in that teacher bubble, and you go to your teacher conferences, and you go to your teacher workshops, but you really need to start thinking about where do you want to potentially end up? Do you want to be in tech? Do you want to be in customer success? Do you want to be in consulting? You know, what does that future life of yours look like? And start going out and meeting people in those fields, going to meet up groups, going to, you know, your alumni chapter events, to meet people that are in those spaces. Getting on LinkedIn, that's a huge miss. If you you know, get on LinkedIn and look up any of your teacher friends, it's very likely that they are not there, and they need to be, you know, building out that professional presence and that professional profile, making yourself open to recruiters and getting really crystal clear on what is it that you want to do professionally? I think too many teachers undervalue their skill sets and their expertise. You are project managing, you are forecasting, you are building out curriculum, you're doing learning and design. I mean, there are so many things that you're doing on a day to day, and you're not giving yourself enough credit for the things that you're doing. And so instead of saying, Oh, I'm just a teacher, no, I'm a project manager, I'm a counselor, I'm a compliance officer, I'm a learning and development coach, you know, really get into the nitty gritty of what your day to day looks like, and then think about what do you want your day to be? If you're teaching and you're in a classroom, you're going into a building every day and you like that community feel working remote in a tech job. Might feel really isolating to you. You might go stir crazy. You might not want to work from home. So even thinking of something as simple as, Do I want to be in an office? Do I want to be hybrid? Do I want to be remote? You know, that's really important, because that's going to be setting up your quality of life, and then, you know, making sure that you're leaning into the parts of your current role as a teacher that you really like. Do you like that curriculum part. Do you like grading papers? Do you like meeting with the parents? Do you like training incoming teachers? There's so many directions that you can take your teaching career. I just want teachers to understand you are not limited, but you do need to expand your network, and you do need to be intentional. It's a really tough market, so starting on this early, right? You can't just say all right, I finished out my contract. It's the summer, and by fall, I'm going to be in tech. That's very unlikely. So being realistic with your timeline, what do your finances look like? Are you willing to maybe, quote, unquote, take a step back so that you can take a leap forward, understanding that you're starting in a new industry. You're getting your feet wet in a new sector, you know, you might have to make some sacrifices. So what will that look like, and is your family able to sustain that change? So digging into those details, I think, is really important.

Jamila Souffrant 23:13

And then I would assume for some people, if they, especially if they spent a little bit of time in that field and teaching where they have a pension, that walking away from that is very scary, or they can't do it. So what are some considerations on how someone should be looking at that if they do have a pension, they don't want to leave?

Jessica Norwood 23:33

Yeah, I think I'll give my answer, and then I'll let Brandon say his. You know, having a pension is fantastic. I think having a high income and opportunities for big bonuses for stocks, sometimes those help bridge the gap. So I certainly would never encourage somebody who's two or three years away from collecting their pension to all of a sudden make that change into tech No, write it out. Do your time, collect your pension, and then you can always pivot. But if you're like me, I left at after my seventh year, and so it was really one of those points where the kind of inside joke is, after 10 years, you stay so I knew I needed to get out before that decade mark. And so my retirement at that point, my 403 B, it didn't have very much in it. I was just surviving, you know, and so for me walking away knowing that I could have a big increase in my earning potential, I didn't look back. But if you're close to that pension, and you're close to retirement, I certainly would say, ride it out, because the pension is so rare these days. So you said what

Brandon Norwood 24:37

I was going to say as far as, how far away are you from, you know, full pension for the retirement aspect. Also, the thing is, too, is that most of the time with those pensions, if you leave teaching, you might have an option to roll over a portion of the money that you've already had contributed to those accounts, but you might want to actually just leave it there, because if you get out of teaching and for whatever reason. You try something different, you don't like it, you miss it. You want to go back to teaching, I believe, with a lot of areas, if you keep the money there, then they'll just basically continue your time on from when you would stop teaching to when you start again. Because if you actually move the money, sometimes that erases that. So if you were to go back to teaching, you're starting from day one again, so you do want to understand the language and the rules around those different types of accounts before making any decisions on what to do with

Jamila Souffrant 25:31

them. Hey, journeyers, if you are loving this podcast, then you will love my book, Your journey to financial freedom, a step by step guide to achieving wealth and happiness. I wrote this book for you. This book is for you if you want a clear and enjoyable path to having more money options and a rich life. This book is for you if you hate your commute and the fact that you need to seek approval or permission from a boss. I hated that when I worked. This book is for you if you weren't born into wealth. You didn't marry rich or win the lottery, but you still want freedom. This book is for you. If you're at a crossroads, a major decision or event is imminent, maybe a career change, marriage, starting a family, pressures are reaching a tipping point, and the discomfort and the desire for more can no longer be ignored. And this book is for you if you find yourself zoned out at meetings, looking out the window or daydreaming about the life you truly want. So go pick up your journey to financial freedom.com. So I can show you how to map out how to get from where you are today to where you ultimately want to be. And enjoy the journey while you're on the path. Head over to your journey to financial freedom.com. To see where you can pick the book up. It's available on Amazon, bookshop.org, Barnes and Noble, your local bookstore everywhere. Go to your journey to financial freedom.com. To get the book now. Now with the two of you, you both are working well. So Brandon, you're an entrepreneur, essentially, with your own financial planning business. And Jessica, I can't believe you still work in corporate America full time, and now you have this online business. And you guys have kids. How many kids do you

Speaker 1 27:14

have? Two, six and five. Okay, so with that, I mean,

Jamila Souffrant 27:18

you're very busy. The two of you, I wanted to, like, explore or talk about just how you're managing your decisions to take on more so like starting sugar daddy podcast and the brand right on top of everything that you're already doing for you guys. How did you weigh the pros and cons of that? Because I'd imagine that you're very busy. But maybe there are some things that are if you're working from home or you have more flexibility, like that helps versus if you're commuting into a job. But I just love to dig into that more and then talk more about like, the income side of things, like, what is the enough point to where this is like too much, and is it ever too much for you? And I want to relax a bit more just enjoy the fruits of our labor versus doing all this work. So I know that was a

Jessica Norwood 28:04

lot. Yeah, let's get into it. So we have two kids. Yes, very busy. It absolutely helps to work from home. I wouldn't even consider a job at this point where I have to spend an hour commuting both ways, twice a day. I mean, that is just such precious time. So we both work from home. My office is downstairs, his office is upstairs, kind of talking about like the modern man, if you will. You know, Brandon does drop off and pick up 99% of the time. The teachers very rarely see my face. He gets to make his own schedule. I don't as much. And so him being the consistent person for that is really helpful. You know, as far as home chores, you know, he's unloading the dishwasher, he's also doing the laundry. I mean, all of that helps in kind of keeping everything going. I will say we watch very little TV. It's work, the podcast and social media, which, you know, is a full time job. We haven't outsourced any of it yet. We're getting there. But as far as managing our finances, I mean, it really is just an all hands on deck approach, again, because when we merged our lives, we were used to paying our own bills, you know, we just kind of decided, all right, let's put this bill on this credit card so we can get these points and, you know, I'll pay that off. And then you take the light bill, and we didn't necessarily do it based on a percentage. If we really look at the breakdown, I'm paying more of the bills because I'm the higher earner. But at the end of the day, we envision the money that is coming in to our home, our money. So it's never my money, my paycheck. It's always our money, our paycheck. And you pick up where you need to. You need to. You know him as an entrepreneur, his income fluctuates. He could be onboarding multiple clients in one month, which is awesome for us, and then he might have a lull, right? So I again find comfort in my stability, right? I find comfort in getting 26 paychecks a year, having that health insurance, having that four. 1k match. That is where I live in my comfort zone. He's able to do what he does because I have the consistent income no matter what. As far as being you know, what's enough, we're trying to be work optional in the next eight to 10 years, and that's just because we'll have teenagers at that time, and we want to be able to fully be there for whatever they need. You know, if it's travel, setting up the dorm room, whatever it is, we want to be able to drop whatever it is we're doing and always prioritize our kids and our family. So that's, that's the ultimate goal, eight to 10 years, to be work, optional.

Brandon Norwood 30:37

And as far as the Podcast, the podcast was 100% her idea. I had no intentions of starting a podcast. Never thought about it, and she had a dream and came up with the name and the concept. Had actually written it down, forgot about it for a few weeks, and then brought it up to me. And the idea kind of came from is that, you know, she's in meetings all day, and she's actually leading a lot of the meetings. So, you know, the end of the day she spent the day she spent and I would be like, oh, you know, I want to talk about this. Talk about that. It's different, you know, finance topics and whatnot, or things that have happened. And she's like, You need to put this on social media. And I was like, well, that doesn't work for me, because I'm very long winded, and social media doesn't really work that well, you know, for long winded individuals. And that's where the idea of the podcast came from, because I definitely would not have done one by myself. He

Jessica Norwood 31:25

needed a new outlet that wasn't me at the end of a long day of work. And I said, do a newsletter? Do the post? Get on Tiktok? And if you know Brandon at all, that's just not how he operates. And so the podcast was a perfect way for him to get his personality out there, get his expertise out there. Help the black and brown community, right? That's what we always set out to do, is, is help empower our community to help build wealth, right? We lose so much generational wealth year after year, family after family, because we don't have the proper protections and systems in place, like your wills, like your trust, you know, like your life insurance, etc. And so that was really the ultimate goal. Is, how can we kind of reach the masses? And, you know, obviously we wanted it to also funnel into the business, which it does, but I just really wanted him to not talk to me at the end of the day

Brandon Norwood 32:16

and a very loving manner. Yeah,

Jamila Souffrant 32:17

right. Well, so Brandon, let's talk a little bit about, I know you work with your clients on their financial goals and systems, and you guys have a dream framework that we're going to get into. Maybe this is the time to do it. But what for you are just the key. If you can give a couple of like, foundational things that you tell your clients that they need to do or get get it together. I think Jessica, you brought some of those stuff up with, like, the will and but what are some things that you are seeing when people come to you and you're just like, this is like, step one, like, we need to do this to help you get started.

Brandon Norwood 32:53

Step one. And it's the universal one. It's very easy, is that you need to spend less than you make. That's the very basis. Because doesn't matter how amazing the plan is, doesn't matter how much money you make if you're spending more money than you're bringing in, that is a recipe for failure. So whenever I sit down with someone and they're already great savers, I already know that, like, more than 50% of my battle is done. Because if you can save money and you're really good at that, all you really need is just someone to help you put the plan into place, and maybe, you know, provide you with a little bit more information. But as Americans, we're terrible savers. In comparison to other first world countries, we're terrible savers. So number one to be saving. And as far as when it comes to, you know, if I'm sitting down with a couple, is they don't have conversations with each other. So I might sit down with a couple and I'm asking them, you know, what are your goals? What are your goals as an individual? What are your goals as a couple? They have no idea. They've never talked about it. They've never, I mean, they may have thought about in their mind, but I don't think they, even if they thought about it, they didn't think about it in the detail that we talk about it. So sometimes I'm sitting down and you have one spouse, you know, talking about a goal, and while I'm hearing it for the first time, so is their partner, you know? So I think that's also a really big issue that people have, is they don't have enough conversations with each other. So

Jamila Souffrant 34:08

is it as simple as depending on if it's just one partner listening to this, right? Going to your partner and saying, What are your goals? Like? Are there some prompts? Because I can imagine, too, that some people are just like, well, like, well, like, I tried to ask this question, this person's not really opening up. You know, we all come with our money baggage and our life stories in relationships. But like, Are there any prompts or ways to get that conversation flowing? There

Brandon Norwood 34:32

definitely are prompts. Because I also think that people don't actually structure their goals properly. So one of the biggest, you know, one of the most common things that I have is I'm sitting down with somebody and asking them about their goals. They have a monetary value as a goal, like, Oh, I wanna, I wanna have a million dollars. I wanna have $2 million and I'm always at the mindset that money, a monetary amount, is not a goal, because money is not a goal. Money is a tool. And once you understand that money's a tool, then you actually use it properly. You know, what is that million dollars gonna allow you to do? What is that $2 million Dollars gonna allow you to do? Is it gonna allow you to, you know, become work optional, and take, you know, six or 10 vacations a year? Is it gonna buy you that lake house? Is it gonna buy you that beach house? Is it gonna provide you, you know, being able to take these vacations with your kids and spend more time and make memories? So you gotta figure out what the money is going to do, because the money itself is not the goal. Nobody's like, I just want to have ten million and not do anything with it.

Jamila Souffrant 35:21

That's a good point. I do think that a lot of it is focused on just the number amount, but it's almost like a, I want to say, cop out, but it's just like an easy, like, just throw a number out there without really thinking about, wait, like, what do you want to do? And sometimes, like, the number, you don't need that much to do what you want to do exactly like sometimes you do depending on what I call guac levels and like your desired lifestyle, yeah? But sometimes it's just like, Oh, so you want to be able to do that? Well, you can actually do that a lot earlier with a lot less money. So let's help you figure that out.

Jessica Norwood 35:53

Yeah, we've had people on the podcast who said that exact thing, right? The goal was X dollars, right? I want to make my first million, and then they realized that their life really didn't change drastically from five or $600,000 to a million, which I understand the privilege of even saying like only 500,000 or only 600,000 I don't want to diminish that. That is an extreme amount of wealth, right? However, how much more time did you spend away from your family, from your friends, doing what you truly love, to get that extra $400,000 and was it worth it? And in most cases, they end up saying, I didn't need the million dollars. I just, quote, unquote, needed the 500,000 or the 300,000 and then my life significantly improved at that time because I was able to get a housekeeper, get a driver for my kids, get a cook to make us healthy family meals so we're not eating out as much, whatever it might be. Again, your goals are your own, but really understanding that the number behind it, like you said, can usually be reached much quicker. And what sacrifice Are you making? Just to say, well, I made 300,000 I made a million, right? Like, what did you sacrifice in the process, and was, was it worth it? And oftentimes it's not.

Brandon Norwood 37:08

Let's say most people have a common goal. They want their time back. They want their time and freedom to do what they want to do. That is lazy Tuesday, common theme. Now, obviously what you do at that time that varies, but most people just want the freedom to have the time to do whatever they want to do.

Jamila Souffrant 37:23

That's what I think, too. I think ultimately it's just this idea of we want our control over our energy and our time. And so many of us don't have that when we're working for other people, even working in our own businesses, as you know Brandon, right? Because it does require you to show up. And so with that, this ability and getting up, people understand, like, the importance of, like, you said, money being a tool to get you what you want. And then knowing that and realizing too, that I always like to say, like, money is literally made up. They print it, and they can print as much of it as they want. Like, you know, when I'm always just even with interest rates. And like, how depending on interest rate, like, someone with the same mortgage amount is paying different, such a different monthly mortgage, just based on the rate, which you know, is decided by so many factors. And just realizing that, I think, can be hard, right? Because if you're growing up in a environment where money is everything, then that is the goal, versus not understanding. Like, wait a second, like, what does this what do I actually want to do to bring my value or work into this world, and how do I want to live? I think are the things we should be spending more time learning about ourselves so we can make those decisions? Yeah,

Jessica Norwood 38:34

and each other. I think what you asked a few minutes ago about, like, Well, how do I just show up to my partner, and how do I just say, All right, let's talk about money. That's really difficult, and I think, you know, you and I and Brandon, we're in this world of like, constantly talking about money, because that's what we do. We do it online. We do it on the podcast. So for us, it's normal, and our goal was to normalize these money conversations. But it's still very taboo to talk about money, to talk about your income, to talk about that bonus, to talk about what did you you know, what's your mortgage What's your mortgage rate? I mean, those are the conversations that we need to have in order to level up, but they're very difficult. And so as Brandon was sharing, you know, he'll never share details about his clients, but he'll say, Hey, I had a couple today, and you could just see they were not on the same page, right? And so one of the things that we wanted to help people with is to have the conversations and to normalize the conversations about money in their homes, and we wanted to take it away from that monetary goal, because, again, it's not the goal, it's just a tool. So what we figured out is that what couples seem to be lacking is that grand vision for their lives. They really are not dreaming big together, and so that's where the dream framework came from. We want you to dive that's the D so we want you to dive into your past really understand why are you the way you are with money? What feelings do you have when you talk about money, when you pay your bills, when you open your mail on a Tuesday? Do you have anxiety? Why? Is that, what did you hear your parents and your family members saying about money? Are you coming into this relationship with a scarcity mindset, a mindset of abundance? It's very common for couples to not have the same background with money, right? You might have somebody who came from extreme poverty and built themselves out of that, and you might have somebody who came from wealth, you have people who, you know, I had $100,000 in student loan debt coming into our relationship. Brandon had no student loans. That was a conversation we needed to have. And so really digging into and diving into understanding, why am I how I am, and why do I feel the way I feel? Next you're going to reflect, how is that showing up in your life today? Because that money, whether it's abundance or scarcity, we all have some sort of trauma. What? How is it showing up? Right? Is it showing up when you have a scarcity mindset and you're holding on to all your money and you're hoarding it, or did you have a scarcity mindset and you're like, if I don't spend it, it's somebody else is going to take it, so I might as well spend it all. I mean, one thing, scarcity mindset, for example, could show up in your life in very different ways. And so really reflecting on, how does it show up in my life, in my relationship, and how can I better control these feelings and these emotions? Next you're going to engage this is the fun part. This is where you and your partner engage with each other to understand what are your dreams? He gets to have separate dreams for me, but we also need to have dreams for our family right now. If you're dating, this works. If you've been married for 25 years, this works. It doesn't matter what kind of relationship you're in. If you're in a partnership, you should be dreaming together, and you should understand your partner's goals. And we don't want you to just say, hey, next summer, we want to go to Greece. That's boring. We want you to dream in detail. We want the we want the specifics get into the nitty gritty. What month, where are you going to stay? How are you going to fly? How are you going to get there? Who's going to pick you up from the airport? What kind of food are you going to eat? How long is this trip going to be? What do you want to see? Everything. What are you going to wear to dinner first, the first night? Have that big, big, big, grand vision for all of those dreams, and do it in detail. Write it down, communicate it often, because that is what you're going to come back to when maybe one partner wants to spend money on something like, I always say, I want the accent wall. I love an accent wall, but Brandon can say, Hey, do we need to spend $1,600 on that accent wall right now? Or is Jamaica for Christmas more important to you? And that goes back to our family goals and visions, which is spending meaningful time with our children and helping them see the world. So I'm always going to choose, all right, we're going to save for that trip, and the accent wall can wait so that that engage portion and dreaming big that's going to help you stay rooted in your goals when things get hard, because let's be serious, the money is going to money. It's going to come, it's going to go, and it's not always a fun conversation. That's the black and white numbers. There are important things, right? Like Brandon said, don't spend more than you have, but it's that vision that's going to keep you inspired to keep going. Then we have act you have to manage the money, right? You have to put a plan in place to actually reach these goals, because otherwise they're literally just streams. So that's when you talk about, how do we want to manage money? Do we want to put everything into one pot and then take it out to pay the bills? Do we want to do this based on a percentage. How are we going to, you know, make sure that our lights stay on, our water stays hot, etc. You get to make those rules. You need to decide. This is how you decide. Hey, when we show up every month for our money meeting, how do we want to do it? Are we old school, pen and paper? Do we want to use an app? Do we want to use an Excel spreadsheet? Do you have anything in mind. This is where you get specific on understanding. Well, how are you going to actually manage your money? So you're taking action to put a plan in place so that you actually have a framework to follow, so that things don't fall through the cracks. And then the last step is managing that right? This is ongoing. You're going to make more money. You're going to lose money, you're going to have unexpected bills, you're going to buy the house, you're going to have the baby. Goals will change. The goals will change. You have to have this conversation ongoing, right? We would say monthly, if not quarterly. I think is the least amount of time that you should be kind of having these conversations and tracking your budget, tracking your spend, but you need to manage the goals and the conversation and how you act to actually execute. And so that manage portion is really important, because you want to make sure that you have a system in place that works for you. How do you like to operate? How do you like to communicate? Is a Friday night for a date night and a money meeting? Does that make sense? Or Are you exhausted by Friday night? And maybe you can do a Sunday morning again? Whatever that looks like for you. You get to make the rules. But we think this is a really good framework for people to get started, to get that empathy, to get that context of why my partner is the way they are with money, and then how is it affecting our life? Showing up in our life together. I

Brandon Norwood 45:02

will say that, you know, putting a plan in place is great, but you need to be more focused on the action of planning, because, like she said, things are going to change. And so you always got to be ready to, you know, make those changes and pivot as you know, life happens. Because life be life, and

Jamila Souffrant 45:16

it does. It sure is. And I think, you know, like you so dream, right? Like the first three letters were more, not action oriented, like it's, you know, you have to put some effort into thinking, and that takes a lot of emotional work. So it's not that that does not take work. I think actually that's the harder work is to date into your past and to be honest about your dreams and reflect, and then, like you said, I'll engage with each other to really get to the root of things. But it's like the last two that people usually just want to jump to. It's like the tangible stuff. I also talk about this. I talked about this in my book, Your journey to financial freedom, you know, like there's these intangible things, intangible things there are actually there's a lot of work that you can do without the physical doing, meaning, like, you don't have to, like, call the bank right away or negotiate with your boss right away. You have to go in tomorrow and work and do that right away. There's all these other things that you need to do. But what I think, what happens with people, and it still happens with me, or most people I know, is that because of that emotional and mental load. It does take a lot to get started, but the benefits once you start like, you'll be able to make the progress you want to see on the action items, not necessarily faster, but it's more sustainable. You're more rooted in like, what it is to want to do, because you did the upfront work properly first. Yeah,

Brandon Norwood 46:38

it's more efficient. Because how are you going to put a plan in place if you don't know what the end goal is going to you want, what you would actually want the end goal to be. So when you start with the planning without talking about, you know, the first, the D, the R, the E, it's not going to be efficient at all, because more than likely, you might end up at a destination, but it's nowhere where you want it to be because you didn't do the work that, you know, the harder work to begin with.

Jessica Norwood 47:00

Yeah, you also want to understand where your partner is coming from. Why do they feel the way they do? Why do they resist when you ask for x, y, z? Why, you know, why do they always order the appetizer? Why do they never order the appetizer? I mean, it's the silly little things that when you put the context around their emotions and their feelings and their background with money and finances that will help you understand why they are the way they are, and that is what you need in order to execute on those goals. You need that context and understanding it

Brandon Norwood 47:33

also allows you to provide empathy as far as you like. She's saying, Why is your partner doing certain things and getting that insight and allowing for the negative things room to grow, but then also looking at the good things that they're doing and continuing those and celebrating those,

Jamila Souffrant 47:49

right? I like that you brought up empathy, because I recently had a conversation with someone and they reflected that they didn't when they were growing up, they could never, like, go out to eat. It was not something that their parents could afford. So when they go out to eat now, there is a sense of pride that they're able to order what they want, and then I'm thinking to there's a lot of people who probably had that experience, like they were so limited in their childhood and they couldn't do what they want, and now they're working so hard. And isn't this why I work? So I could go out and get the damn guacamole, because you might have a different upbringing where you're just like, I can say no to the appetizer in guacamole, because that trip to Jamaica, okay, means more, and then you don't understand why your partner can't say no to that in the moment. And for them, though, that means so much, because it's all that you know past childhood that it's bringing that up. It's

Jessica Norwood 48:38

so funny that you mentioned that, because that's actually a conversation we've had, because we very rarely went out to eat growing up, but when we did, everybody got water. You know, you did not get the appetizer, you did not get the dessert. And if my dad got, you know, more than one beer, he was about to get a side eye from my mom, right? So that is my memory. And I just remember growing up being like, what's the point of even going out to dinner if you're not going to enjoy to enjoy it? And so Brandon knows I would rather stay at home and eat chips and salsa out of a jar than go out to dinner and be restricted, right? If I want the app, we're going to get the app. If I want the cocktail, I'm going to get the cocktail. If he wants the molten chocolate lava cake at the end, he gets the chocolate lava cake at the end. If we're going to dinner, we're going to dinner. If we're going to have restriction, we're going to stay home, because I don't want to do it halfway. And again, that's 100% straight from my childhood, right? That's something that I observed, and I said, we're not going to do it this way, so I'd rather stay home and not do it at all than to do it with Okay, don't forget, you can only get the water today, or no, no, that's an 1199 appetizer. We're not going to do that. That is not how I want to go out and enjoy my dinner. But those are the conversations. They seem so silly, but that's how you get to know your partner. That's how you start to understand why they are the way they are, and why they operate that way. So it's really you should feel excited. It about getting to know your partner in this intimate way that's just not common. You know, having those conversations, what was, what were the holidays like? What was Christmas like? Did you only do stocking stuffers? Did you get socks and underwear, or did you get the light up tricycle, you know, like, whatever it is, understanding, hey, my partner wants to go overboard and go into debt for Christmas because he never had the huge Christmas morning, and that's now what he wants to provide his kids. Like we are rooted, whether we like it or not, in our money traumas and experiences, so you might as well dig in and get ahead of it. I mean,

Brandon Norwood 50:38

also too, even from like a planning standpoint. For example, as she had mentioned earlier, she has student loans. I didn't, I had a, you know, some scholarships, but the remaining amount that was owed, my mom paid. And you know, that was a difference of upbringing and difference of initial opinion, because when we first started talking about it, just was like, well, they could just take out student loans. And I was like, I would prefer that we pay for so they don't have to worry about that. And that's having a conversation and then coming to an agreement on how you are going to do it together. But that difference of opinion is initially based in the difference of our upbringings. And

Jamila Souffrant 51:11

what I just love about the human experience is that you can literally have a similar upbringing to someone, but take away and want to do something opposite. So you could have, Jessica said, Well, you know, I definitely want to help pay for college because I didn't have that. And you could have been the opposite, you know. So I just think it's so, even if you had a similar experience, like you as a human, put your own lens on it, and then you have the ability to act in the way that makes your life, your life, which I think is just so interesting, which is why, still the conversations and the empathy and understanding needs to be there as a couple to talk through these scenarios and these situations, to get to a common ground. And the other thing is, too, like we were talking about, you know, maybe not deciding to do something because of that goal that's further out. And sometimes you might say, You know what it in the season of life that I'm in and how I'm feeling, even though I do want to go on the vacation, I rather have these everyday or more often occurring experiences that pour into me. So maybe the vacation this year doesn't work. I think the problem for more people, or some people, is that they still want to do both like, there's still no like, Okay, so we're gonna do it this way. Then, then we gotta, we gotta be more realistic about that goal that we are taken away from. And then, because the things are not clear, and they don't, like, have their money in front of them, like, knowing what needs to happen, it's like, no, but why can't we just do both? It's like, you don't have enough money to do both, and that's why, yeah, we're gonna be in this situation, absolutely,

Jessica Norwood 52:40

yeah. You have to ground yourself back in the numbers. I mean, again, nobody wants to look at the numbers, but if you're not looking at them, you're never going to reach your goals. You have to understand what you just said. Jamila, you know, you're going to have to sacrifice something if you can do the accent wall and the trip to Jamaica. Good for you. Love that for you. Most of us, especially in this economy, are going to have to sacrifice something. So you have to go back to your goals and say, well, is my kids growing up with an accent wall more important? Or is my kid grow kids growing up with memories and traveling the world more important for us? And again, there's no wrong answer for us. It's our kids traveling the world and having those experiences with us, so we're gonna always lean back into Travel.

Jamila Souffrant 53:23

And for me, I'd be like, it's mom and dad that want to enjoy the accent wall. You kids can like, wait, no, but that's good. So Jessica and Brandon, please tell everyone more about the podcast, like the topics you discuss, where they can find it, and then more about where they can find you on social media, yeah, yeah.

Jessica Norwood 53:40

So at the sugar daddy podcast on all channels, we also have a YouTube and a newsletter. We drop episodes the first three Wednesdays of every month. We have solo episodes for him and I, as well as lots of guests. So we have incredible guests on the podcast talking about estate planning, prenups, bankruptcy, student loan attorneys coming up in the new year, everything from entrepreneurship and business to how to, you know, be a single mom and still plan for retirement. I mean, we really, again, want to normalize just any conversation around money, building wealth and setting yourself up for a fantastic work, optional life, if that's what you're going for. And

Brandon Norwood 54:23

I would say our primary target is the elder millennial. So think about anything as another millennial, that any issues that you're facing that have some type of monetary aspect to them, we try to cover all of them absolutely,

Jessica Norwood 54:34

by

Jamila Souffrant 54:36

the way, settle this for me, what is the elder millennial? What like age is that?

Jessica Norwood 54:40

Yeah. So our target demographic, and what we see on our surveys and things are 35 to 44 is kind of our age bracket. The elder millennial. I was born in 85 he's born in 83 I think technically it goes down to 1990 so or up to 1990 as a millennial. But again, we're on that other spectrum, where we're creeping into that Gen X generation. So yeah,

Jamila Souffrant 55:06

I guess I'm an elder millennial too. All right. Well, this is great. Thank you. Thank you so much for coming on the show, and I'll link all the links in the show notes. Thank you. Thank you for having us. Don't forget you can get the episode show notes for this episode by going to journey to launch.com or click the description of wherever you're listening to this and you can still grab your jumpstart guide for free to help you on your journey to financial freedom by going to journey to launch com slash jumpstart, if you want to support me and the podcast and love the free content and information that you get here. Here are four ways that you can support me in the show. One, make sure you're subscribed to the podcast wherever you listen, whether that's Apple podcast, that purple app on your phone, your Android device, YouTube, Spotify, wherever it is that you happen to listen, just subscribe so you are not missing an episode. And if you're happening to listen to this in Apple podcasts, rate review and subscribe there. I appreciate and read every single review. Number two, follow me on my social media accounts. I'm at journey to launch on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, and I love, love, love interacting with journeyers. There three, support and check out the sponsors of this show. If you hear something that interests you. Sponsors are the main ways we keep the podcast lights on here, so show them some love for supporting your girl four and last but not least, share this episode, this podcast, with a friend or family member or co worker so that we can spread the message of Journey to launch. All right, that's it until next week. Keep on journeying. Journeyers and.

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