Women, Wealth, And Power | Cary Carbonaro | Growing Money Podcast

In this episode of Growing Money with Sean Trace, I sit down with Cary Carbonaro, CFP®, MBA, a women and wealth expert who has spent 25 years helping women understand money, investing, financial planning, and long-term wealth building. 

This conversation hit me hard as a father, because so much of what Cary shares is about preparing the next generation of women to own their financial future with confidence. We talk about the great wealth transfer, why women are expected to control a massive share of wealth in the coming years, and why the financial industry still has not fully adapted to serve them. Cary also breaks down the myths women are taught about money, why cash can feel safe but hold people back, how divorce and widowhood expose gaps in financial relationships, and why basic money skills should be taught before adulthood. 

This episode is really about empowerment, education, and changing the way families talk about money.

What is one money lesson you wish you had learned earlier in life?

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Just because women have money or make money or know how to make money or their bank account gets bigger doesn't mean they necessarily understand money, know what to do with it, have a good relationship with money, understand it, all of those things, right? So I work with a lot of successful women, um, female breadwinners who are, you know, running companies and really very successful at what they do. But that doesn't mean they understand money. As a matter of fact, they completely don't, which is why I'm there as their advocate and their CFP and their, you know, female conciliary, because I'm there to teach them and to help them understand their relationship with money and what it can do for you. And so it's so interesting because I did a breakfast in New York City a couple of months ago with all these women in their 30s, 40s, and 50s, all super successful. I think almost everybody in the room made at least half a million dollars a year. Some made over a million, and all of them wanted to ask me basic money questions that they were embarrassed to ask anyone else. And so I'm talking about like, what's a Roth? What's the difference between a Roth and a regular IRA? Like really basic, basic stuff. And these are women who are making a million dollars a year. And I was just could not believe it. I wish we could have filmed it, but you know, privacy and stuff, we didn't.

SPEAKER_01 1:31

Welcome everybody back to the Growing Money with Sean Trace Podcast. I have an awesome guest with me today, which like to tell people who you are and a little bit about what you do.

SPEAKER_00 1:40

Sure. My name is Carrie Copenaro, and I am known in the industry for being a women and wealth expert. I have been in the industry for 25 years. I've written two books on the subject. I um educate the public, which is mainly women, and then I also educate the industry, which is men and women. And I also am involved with the CFP board. I'm a CFP board ambassador. I have my own multimillion dollar practice focusing on women. And this is my life's work and my life calling. So love talking about the subject.

SPEAKER_01 2:17

All awesome places to start. But because I want to start with where you started, how did you get started in this industry? What was it that called you toward money, you know, and personal finance? Was there a singular event or was it a series of events that kind of got you moving forward?

SPEAKER_00 2:34

Yeah, I would say it was my dad. Um, and it's so interesting because he was worked for JP Morgan Chase for most of his career. And me and my dad bonded over money like kids bond over sports. And so back in the day, like way back when I went to Take Your Daughter to Work Day, before there was a take your daughter to work day. So he would take me to work and we did all this cool stuff. I knew all about money at a very young age. I thought it was normal. I thought all families talked about this. I thought everybody knew what I knew. Um, and I didn't realize till I got older that this was not normal. Um, so I went with him to foreclosure auctions and um personal finance speakers, and we had um online banking in our living room, the first online banking ever called Pronto, which which Chemical Bank came out in the early 80s, and I was doing transactions, financial transactions on my TV as a teenager, which I thought was like so incredible. So it's it was so natural for me to be able to be in this profession. I just didn't even know it was a profession. I didn't know I could get paid to do this. I thought I was gonna be a professor or a teacher, but now I think I am still that, but I teach money.

SPEAKER_01 3:51

That's awesome. I um I was an educator for many years. I was a children's teacher for many years. And I um also did media on the side. I moved to Vietnam after working in Hollywood, and uh because Hollywood was having a tough time, moved back here, met my wife, who is a famous singer. She's the first winner of Vietnam Idol. So it's like being married to the Vietnamese version of Kelly Clarkson wrapped up with Beyoncé, because my wife, for the for the Lion King, uh in the Vietnamese version for all of Beyoncé stuff, my wife sang Beyoncé stuff. And uh my wife also got to sing the role of Matangi, one of the villains in um in Moana, which was pretty cool too. So we we went to to do all the Moana stuff. It was fun, it's a lot of fun. But when I got here, uh we got married, and I have this wonderful little daughter that is the light of my life. And one day she came up to me and started asking me about money. And I I love my family. I love my dad so much. I love my mom, but my parents were super money avoidant. They did not talk about money, and it suddenly I was sitting there going, how can I find out about this? And I know that I'm good at media. I know that I'm good at talking to people and meeting people. And so I decided to go a different way, to find a different way forward. And I created this podcast. You know, I wanted to learn and I wanted to teach. And because I was a teacher, I figured, you know, people like me didn't know the right questions to ask, you know, and having a daughter that was asking me questions about money even more, I realized that there were answers that I didn't know where to look. And you write that about you deal a lot with women in finance and money. And, you know, this is one of like my personal assistant is awesome. She helps me find guests. And we worked, and I said, okay, we're gonna search the word CFB, you know, put it in there. And she looked at them, and she's Vietnamese, she's a woman, she's a lesbian, she is looking at this and she's like, Mr. Sean, there's a problem here. I was like, what? What do you see? She's like, all these people look the same. And I said, hmm, you said it, not me. But, you know, I noticed that and I said, Well, how can what can we do? She's like, we need to talk to different types of people. These all, these people all look the same. And I said, That's our goal. Help me find people that can be more diverse. And she loved it. No, for my own daughter, I wanted to talk to you because what you shared in your book that's coming out, you write that woman control more wealth than ever before. Yes, and we're in the middle of the still financially confident.

SPEAKER_00 6:43

Yeah. So we're we're actually in the middle. Sorry, I'm I jumped right in there. We're in the middle of the great wealth transfer, which a lot of people don't know about it unless you're within the industry. And even if you're within the industry, you still don't know what to do about it, and nobody's actually doing anything about it. So, what it is is I have known since 2015, so over a decade, McKinsey came out with a report that the future of wealth management is female. And they said by 2030, women are going to control two-thirds of the nation's wealth, which is $30 trillion in the United States, which is the same as the GDP of the United States. So we're talking about massive numbers. And then even going out even further to 2048, it's 54 trillion. So the numbers just keep ballooning. And it's a combination of like all these different things because people always say, well, why is that happening? And is it just because women live longer? Well, and it's it's it's a combination of four different things. One, yes, women live longer. We have longevity. So they're inheriting money from their spouses who are dying and their baby boomer parents who are dying, who are going to be dying. So it's both those two things. Then we have gray divorce, which is happening now, 40% of divorces with women over the age of 50. So that's happening. Then we have uh female entrepreneurs, women starting businesses faster than men because they're frustrated with the corporate structure that's not working for them, and this will give them more control over their lives. Then the fourth and final reason is women are becoming breadwinners in the United States. Um, I don't know the global numbers, I just know the United States numbers, but the global numbers are also there. But women in the United States are going to become primary breadwinners in the United States for the first time in history, 2030 and beyond. So all these amazing things are happening. So, and then the second part of your question is why are they not confident, right? Or why do they feel like they're not confident? So just because women have money or make money or know how to make money or their bank account gets bigger doesn't mean they necessarily understand money, know what to do with it, have a good relationship with money, understand it, all of those things, right? So I work with a lot of successful women, um, female breadwinners who are, you know, running companies and really very successful at what they do. But that doesn't mean they understand money. As a matter of fact, they completely don't, which is why I'm there as their advocate and their CFP and their, you know, female conciliary, because I'm there to teach them and to help them understand their relationship with money and what it can do for you. And so it's so interesting because I did a breakfast in New York City a couple of months ago with all these women in their 30s, 40s, and 50s, all super successful. I think almost everybody in the room made at least half a million dollars a year. Some made over a million, and all of them wanted to ask me basic money questions that they were embarrassed to ask anyone else. And so I'm talking about like, what's a Roth? What's the difference between a Roth and a regular IRA? Like really basic, basic stuff. And these are women who are making a million dollars a year. And I was just could not believe it. I wish we could have filmed it, but you know, privacy and stuff, we didn't.

SPEAKER_01 10:09

I I started this podcast because I didn't have answers to some of those basic questions that I was terrified and embarrassed that I didn't know what certain accounts were. Like people were going, do you have this? You're like, and I'm just like, I don't even know what that is.

SPEAKER_00 10:27

Right.

SPEAKER_01 10:27

Right? It was painful inside, you know, but like I was like, I want other people to be able to find this stuff out. And one of the things that I was realizing is as I was doing more of these podcasts, the information is skewed toward one side of the spectrum, you know, uh more toward extremely wealthy people. And then I also skewed more toward men. And I just was like, there's gotta be a way to fix this, you know? And and why do you think there's such a gap between, you know, this information going to different groups when obviously women are gonna be taking over so much of this wealth? Why is it still set up this way?

SPEAKER_00 11:06

Well, because it was it, the industry was created by men for men. So they have only dealt with women as an afterthought in the industry, and they have not been the primary consumer of wealth management products. So this whole shift that's happening that is upon us now. That's why I literally wrote the book and the playbook and the textbook for the industry to learn how to deal with the shift and learn how to work with women. Um, and it's interesting because like I have one right here, I'll show you. So here's here's the book. But anyway, it doesn't, we're not ready for it. And that's the crazy thing is it's only we're so close. We're, you know, uh three and a half years away and we're not ready for it. So you have to understand historically, women have just not been in the conversation. Well, and and so I I like to use this quote that's in my book on page 75, and it's from Gloria Steinem, and it says, We will never solve this is my favorite one. Let me see. I just I don't I want to get it right. We will never solve the feminization of power until we solve the masculinity of wealth. So and what I say on that one, I translate it and make it a little bit simpler to understand, is that money equals power and women need more of both. And that's my translation to that quote.

SPEAKER_01 12:30

Ooh, I love that. I love that. I see that what I see that what my wife has had to go through in her career. I see already the things that are projected onto my daughter. And I am doing everything. She's 10. She's 10.

SPEAKER_00 12:53

Okay. It's a critical age.

SPEAKER_01 12:55

It is. And we're talking about money, we're talking about how to empower. And one of the things that I've been doing is since she was a little kid, we've had a YouTube channel for her that she does with me. And so it's called Eilani's Little World, and we have 11,000 subscribers, and we go out and we talk to all of these scientists, these people, we talk to entrepreneurs, we talk to anyone you can imagine. I would actually love for you, if you might be willing, to come back and do some five questions for an Eilani's Little World after that. Sure. I would love to. It's so much fun. And we talk to these people because I want to be able to help her see more of the world and engage with it. But like I see these challenges that my wife has had. And, you know, like we're talking in entertainment, like Harvey Weinstein type people, you know, just preying upon people. Right. And those are the people that we see. But the whole financial system, I was watching an episode of Mad Men the other day, and I was just like, wow, this is the system that was built, you know? And I was like thinking, what's one thing that you think women can do right now to start changing their financial futures? To really say, hey, let's reclaim this power because it's already coming. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:10

What can people start doing right now? So a coup a couple things. I can't just make it one. I have to answer this multiple multiple layers. So the first, the first thing they need to do is they need to own their own financial future. They cannot uh make sure that somebody else is gonna be responsible for it. A spouse, a father, uh, you know, somebody, somebody other than them. They own it, they should be owning it. Like so it's interesting because I did a I did a speech with young girls at a very expensive high school, very high-end high school. And I said, How many of you girls think that you're gonna be responsible for your own financial future? And probably 10% of the hands went up, and 90% did not. And I was like, I cannot believe this. Who do they think is gonna be responsible? Obviously, it's it's somebody else. But I don't like that. Every woman has to own it. And guess what? In most cases, 90% of women are going to be on their own at some point in their life, either single, divorced, widowed, whatever, they're still gonna be on their own and be responsible for themselves. So you should learn it now. So that's the first thing. Second thing is to know your numbers. I think that, you know, women get sometimes emotional around money because money is more emotional to women than it is to men, because we attach emotions to the money. Um, and sometimes it's fear, sometimes it's um uh control, sometimes it's um elation. So it's all all different types of emotion. Sometimes it's even love. So everything gets wrapped up into that, into that. So you have to separate the emotion from the actual what the what the money is. So that's the second thing. Third thing is know your numbers, meaning know what is your budget. So know what's coming in and what's going out every single month so that you can see what's left over. Because if you have money left over and you're not spending everything that you make, which is what I would like you to do, then that's where financial planning comes stems from that, what the money that's left over. That's how you create wealth long term. And then the next number that I I want everybody woman to know is, or men too, they can know this too, but especially women, your net worth, which is your assets minus your liabilities equals your net worth, which is everything that you own minus everything that you owe equals your net worth. And that is should be growing every single year if you're doing all the right things, like paying down debt, paying down your mortgage, putting putting money into your retirement, um, you know, not carrying balances on your uh credit cards, all of that stuff. So that's the basics, super basic stuff.

SPEAKER_01 16:53

I love it. One of the things that I think is I I want to go back to that first point because you're speaking my language and something that I talked to my daughter about. Um preparedness, being prepared to handle things yourself. Uh when my daughter was younger, um I got her, I'm a black belt in judo, Japanese style jujitsu. And I did muitaya for a long time. Um and so I I work out multiple days a week doing martial arts. And I got my daughter into it. My wife's like, this is too violent. And I said, I think she needs to stick with it. She's like, ah, it's too violent, let's get her out. And she stayed with that opinion until something happened. My daughter went on a field trip, and one of the security guards at the um swimming pool started following her, followed her around the pool, and nothing happened. But my daughter came home and said, I really felt uncomfortable. This guy, he followed me to the bus. He walked up to the bus and started tapping on the window, looking at me, trying to get my attention. And my wife and I were like, All right, first of all, you're not going to that pool again unless we're one of us is there. I went there, I confronted the guy, and I was like, leave my kid alone, don't do that. Just trying to don't, just nothing. Right. And then I looked at my wife and I said, I protected her today, but I can't always do that. She needs to be able to protect herself. So we got her into martial arts, and she's been in Muay Thai now for five years. She's 10, she's been there for five years. And one of the things that I that popped up for me is when um she today, uh the other day, she I was like playing with her. I was like, oh, let's do a little sparring. And she hit me. And I thought, I was like, it's not gonna be. No, she hit me. And it was, I I felt, I was just like, all right. Wow. All right, okay. Now that's what we're talking about. Today she started her first volleyball class. She's a tall kid, she's a tall 10-year-old, like really tall. Uh, she's like 5'6 at like 10. She's a really tall little girl. And we in went into the the volleyball class and she'd never played volley before. And the coach came up, he's like, you know, when she was playing, he's like, What? How long has she done this volleyball? I was like, this is her first class. And he says, It's wild because when she was training, I kept asking, Do you need a break? And she looked at me, she says, I'm not tired. I don't need a break. And she just kept going. He said, I've never met a kid who did that. Why I'm bringing this up is not to brag on my kid too much, but because we, my wife and I realized early on that we needed to start teaching her skills. Skills because we're not always going to be there.

SPEAKER_00 19:41

Right. Life skills.

SPEAKER_01 19:42

Life skills. Right. And yet people forget about the financial life skills. How can we also teach her these same financial life skills so that, you know, I'm teaching her how to defend herself so that she doesn't have to rely on anyone else to do that for her. But what about the money skills? You know, and it leads to another question. Like, this is the question I've been thinking like, what's one money lesson you wish every girl learned before graduating high school, you know?

SPEAKER_00 20:10

This is very silly. I'll tell you a story and then I'll tell you why I say this. So I was in my first job out of college, and I was working at um JP Morgan Chase, and I was at the bank, and I had this woman who came in who was, you know, well dressed and she was a college graduate, and she came to me and she said, Um, there's something wrong with my account. And she gives me her account and I pull it up and I said, You're overdrawn. And she said, I can't be. I still have checks left.

SPEAKER_01 20:41

Oh wow. Oh wow.

SPEAKER_00 20:45

So basic math and money math is the most important thing that you can learn in high school. You should know how to what well, I mean, we don't even use checks anymore, but you should know how to balance whatever balancing your your accounts are, or what debits and credits are, what um how money grows, what the power of compounding interest, all of that stuff, all the basics of personal finance, I would like a girl to know by the time she's 18.

SPEAKER_01 21:17

It's wild that I you're saying that, but I I've known people that have like statements like that. I've seen it, you know, and I think this is where um, first of all, I can go on and off on school for days. Yes. But I don't think that we're we're teaching kids how to be prepared. I don't think we're teaching people how to be ready for the world. And even more of a disservice, I think, to the little girls out there because, you know, oh, you can, you know, you have this or that. And, you know, this idea that I I had someone we get this a lot with my daughter, and I live in a culture that is much more patriot, uh Like of a patriarchy, much more. And so they see this tall, beautiful young woman, and they go, She should be a model. And I said, or a lawyer, or an artist, or a doctor, or an engineer, or whatever she wants. Right. But we have these things that we assign to gender, maleness. And I want to talk about this for personal finance because you talk about bro culture and financial services. Yes. And what does that look like and how has it affected the way women think about investing in wealth building?

SPEAKER_00 22:36

So bro culture is real. Um, it is how the industry was built, you know, because again, my the industry is mainly men. It's about 80% men, 20% women, and the women who are in it have to be very strong to be in it and stay in it. So bro culture is built around competition and jargon and what how we're measured. We're measured. Um, I always call it a male measuring stick. It's called AUM, which is called assets under management. And nobody wants to even talk to you until they know what's your AUM. And if you get quoted in a magazine, they want to know what's your AUM. Like it's literally your name and then your AUM. So what's funny is it's such a, it's such a not true measure because let's say, let's say I'm gonna make up a number. You have $100 million of AUM, but you have, which is means you let's say you make a million dollars a year. I'm just gonna round it off, right? But you have um that's if you are charging 1%. But a lot of people who just want to get that number up, let's say they charge half of that. So now they're at $500,000. But then they have a huge staff and they have a huge expensive office. And now their net revenue, let's say, is $100,000 a year. So that that so there you've got one person making saying, my AUM is is a hundred is a hundred million, but their net revenue is a hundred thousand, which nobody ever asks. And then you have that same woman who is making, let's say, a hundred million and actually charging the 1%. And she's the only, let's say she's the only employee and she keeps her expenses low, she's making a million dollars a year. She's making 90% more than that guy in that in that situation. But again, not measured like that. We're not measured, we're not measured, we're only measured by that, by that inflated male number. Um, and then also women were left out of the conversation. Again, like I always, like I said earlier, women were not even part of wealth management. Women women in in our industry have only been looked at in two categories only. Women have only been in wealth management divorced or widowed. Nothing else. Absolutely nothing else. We don't even exist unless we're divorced or widowed. Where and I, in my book, I have a whole life cycle like of all these different life events for women. And women are all these different things. Like menopause is like, and perimenopause is like a huge part of women's lives that are completely left out and nobody even discusses it. And it like really affects women. Could it affect women from age 30 to 100? So you could be in menopause for like most of your life or perimenopause for most of your life, not even looked at as an option for as like a life event for women. So, and also the bro culture. In my in my book, I talk about bro culture and lawsuits. And unfortunately, I bring up all the class action lawsuits in my industry that have negatively impacted women. So we are not that many years away from all of that stuff happening. As a matter of fact, Goldman Sachs settled out of court their class action lawsuit with women, I think it was 2023, 2022 or 2023. I think it was 2023. So we're only a couple of years away from that.

SPEAKER_01 25:58

That's wild. It it's crazy because I think that you always you hear about everyone likes to think that, well, that was so long ago. Right. So that's why I say it's not.

SPEAKER_00 26:14

That was in the past, it's not. It's the that was in the past.

SPEAKER_01 26:17

It's so long ago, you know, and I think that's one of the challenges and one of the myths that people have that these bad things that happened were a long time ago. But reality is they were much more recent, you know. And I want to ask you this because um, you know, women are facing a lot of challenges. And and why do you think so many women leave a financial advisor after a divorce or losing a spouse? Like these challenging moments that they're that's an easy one.

SPEAKER_00 26:49

So so that number has not changed in decades. And it's between, they say it's between 70 and 90. So we'll split the difference and say it's 80% of women leave their advisors. But it's such a simple thing because the entire time before the person died or got divorced, there was no engagement with that spouse. It was, let's say we have a meeting with with the two of them, and the entire time the woman's being ignored. She's not being spoken to, she's not being asked her her goals or what's important to her. They're having only eye contact with the male spouse the whole entire time. The woman is made to feel less than or ignored. And then as soon as it the event happens, she needs empathy, she needs education, she needs empowerment, she needs the opposite of what she's just been getting for all these years leading up to that. So she is right out the door as soon as it happens and trying to find her person. So by that time it happens, it's too late.

SPEAKER_01 27:47

Right. And it's like we have to find people that we can trust. And one of the things that's important to me in trust is people that can understand like a shared experience, understand what you've gone through, and understand where you've been. You know, but I want to ask you this because it has me think about this like, what are some of the biggest financial myths women have been taught that simply aren't true?

SPEAKER_00 28:08

Oh, there's so many. I actually wrote an article um for Financial Advisor Magazine about this, but I'll just give you some other highlights. Um of them are silly. Like some of them are, you know, women have been taught that money is the root of all evil. That's a silly one. Um, or that money is selfish and they shouldn't want to have money. They should, you know, that that's that's totally not true because why can men have it and they can't? Like it's it's so ridiculous. Um, or like the one we were talking about earlier, someone's gonna take care of it for me. Um, I hate, I hate that one. Um, cash is king. That's another one that women, women uh, in my experience and my clients love to hold on to cash. They feel like cash is a safe nest egg, like if you keep it in cash. But I always try to explain to them you're not keeping pace with inflation. You have longevity risk, you need to win be invested for the long term. So you're actually losing money when you keep your money in cash, even though it feels safe. And then my favorite one that I hate the most is you can lose all of your money in the stock market. That myth. You cannot. Unless you put it all in a single stock that goes bankrupt, or you put it in a Ponzi scheme. Neither of which is happening with a professional CFP or fiduciary advisor or RAA. Not happening.

SPEAKER_01 29:31

You've worked with women every stage of life. What financial challenges tend to surprise women that most uh the most as they move through their careers, marriage, parenthood, divorce, or retirement? What's really popping up?

SPEAKER_00 29:43

Yeah, I've got a lot of those too. So um, first, when I tell women this, they really shocked because the longevity issue for women, because we live so long that women could be actually retired longer than they actually worked. And people are completely shocked by that. Like nobody, like it just reframes the whole situation and freaks everybody out. Um, then women spend a lot more money on retirement, uh, in retirement on healthcare, like anywhere from $250,000 to $350,000 more than men because women's bodies are more complicated because of the menopause thing, because a lot of it's not covered by insurance. I believe that will change when we get to the wealth, great wealth transfer. I'm hoping that that's one of the first things to change. Um, so that's another issue that people are surprised by. Um, the caregiving wealth gap is a huge one. So women are out of the workforce, either having children, taking care of children, or taking care of parents. And that costs women over a million dollars in wealth over their lifetime, which is totally crazy. Um, and really the the issue is that there's so much complexity because you know, women is not a straight line up path. It's it's a little bit like this. And so, because of the complexity in women's lives, it makes it a little bit harder to plan. And so not it's not impossible. I do it all day, every day. It's just more a little bit, there's a little bit more road bumps and and and things to consider in the plan.

SPEAKER_01 31:19

I think that's huge because there are so many things to consider. This is not like a black and white issue, there's a lot of different components. And I think that like what you're telling me and what I've heard so far is like you have a systemic thing. You also have different needs. And I think that one of the things that I love that I'm hearing is that this isn't just about learning for yourself. This is about there is going to be an opportunity for women to change the whole system. To sit there and go, it's coming. Enough is enough. I mean, you think about that. Like, I was looking at this one picture just last week of, and this is gonna tie into with something you just said, the meeting between the US and China, big meeting, yes, uh, a week or two ago, and US had a big delegation. China had a big delegation. Now, you know the one thing that was interesting in that room zero woman. I know. I saw it. Zero women. And if woman money equals power, then as we have this financial shift, the women are gonna be in those rooms and they're gonna be the ones calling, making these policy calls. They're gonna be the ones in these meetings, and we have a potential to change it so that my granddaughters and my great-granddaughters won't have to put up with some of the same BS that my wife and daughter had to put up with, you know?

SPEAKER_00 32:49

So there's there's an adorable movie that just came out on Netflix called Ladies First. If you haven't seen it, you have to see it. You have to watch it with your wife, and and maybe your daughter will like it too, even though she's 10. It's totally adorable, but it flips so that the world is uh uh female dominated instead of male dominated. And all the things that go along with that, you have to watch it. You will love it. It's very, very funny.

SPEAKER_01 33:14

What was the name again?

SPEAKER_00 33:15

It's called Ladies First. It just came out about a week ago on, and it's it's fantastic. And you'll love the you'll love the marketing, how they do it. It's because it's it's a it's a marketing organization that that's playing in the in the in the in the movie.

SPEAKER_01 33:29

I love that. And it it's awesome because it's something that we need to to think about more often. But like I want to ask you this because for someone listening right now who feels embarrassed because they don't understand investing, retirement accounts or financial planning, they don't know where to start. What would you say to them?

SPEAKER_00 33:49

Well, first of all, there's no better time than like right now. Um, you have to do it. Like, you have to learn it. And and back to one other thing I was just gonna say, we you were talking about earlier about not learning it in high school. I so a lot of the states right now are putting in financial literacy classes in high school as a requirement. I'm in Florida and our state is starting next year. So in 2027, all high school people are gonna have to have a personal finance course or financial literacy, whatever they're calling it. But um, so anyway, it's it's coming. So everybody knows it's it's missing. The problem is the teachers are afraid to teach it, but that's that's another whole story. But anyway, so back to what they should do. They should um own their own financial future. Like there's no chance, no reason for you not to learn this. And everybody, no matter where you are, you have to start. So, like, I would love you to have started yesterday, but today's just as good. So, you know, you have to start today. Um, and you could literally just I mean, go to my website, go to carrycarbonaro.com. I have like pages and pages and hours and hours and hours and and of like podcasts and TV interviews and articles and just so much a massive amount of information. Um, and then also just start literally find the only thing I would say is I was gonna say find it for free. But the only thing I I don't try I don't trust and I don't like is I don't like like uh fin in fin influencers or people who are not regulated or who do not have degrees or experience, who are touting things because they can, because they have nobody watching them and they can say whatever they want. Those things make me scared. Um, and I always say that there's no get rich quick. There's only get rich slow. So if somebody's telling you how to get rich quick, I would run from that. And I would also, if you're really looking for somebody with credentials, I would only be listening to somebody who has a CFP, which is board certified financial planner. So, like, just like if you go to a doctor or a lawyer, you want them to be board certified. You want your financial planner to be board certified as well.

SPEAKER_01 36:01

I love that. And I think it's great advice. And I think it's something that's so important. Like, I don't want to send my children to school with a teacher who does not know what they're doing. And, you know, is like, I'm gonna help you learn how you can learn all of your education in one year. And my daughter is like 10 years old, is like, what? Yeah, okay. You know, I think that, you know, teaching people how to play the long game is an important thing. How can parents help their children, especially daughters, develop a healthy and confident relationship with money, though?

SPEAKER_00 36:31

So I think that they should be starting talking about it any like having the money conversations with their children. So, like, teach them about budgeting, teach them about you know, just have the conversations openly about money. Um, also, believe it or not, at age 10 to 12, girls start to feel like they're not as good with math, and then they get discouraged from the teachers and they think that that it's all about math and money is math, and it is not. Um, it's funny because when I was younger, because I knew money, I would always say, let's change this problem, this math problem, into a money problem and then I can solve it. But if you gave it to me as a math problem, I was like, no, no, I need it to be a money problem. Let's let's I would literally reframe it and then I could then I could do it. Because I knew money, but I didn't think I knew math, which is funny because obviously I know everything with I know all of that now, but there is a difference between money and math, and it's quite easy once you can figure it out. Um, but I think I think that that the young girls between ages 10 through 12 is very critical where they start to disengage with math. And so um there's a bunch of programs in the states um called, there's one called Rock the Street Wall Street, where they go into the classrooms and they work with girls, I think it's age, I don't know if it's 10 to 18 or 12 to 18, and they go into the classrooms and they only work with girls and sometimes they bring the moms too, but there's no boys allowed in the class ever. And they teach them financial literacy skills and they've been doing it for years and they track their progress and um CFP boards involved with it. And so that's like one program that I know that really works great. And they have all these studies about how girls start to lose it in that and in that age group and start to feel discouraged. And even the teachers call on the boys when it comes to math and don't call on the girls. So it's again, that's systemic, also.

SPEAKER_01 38:37

I'm glad you're saying this, and I'm glad people are bringing this up and I'm glad we're talking about this. For my daughter, she started having a hard time with math. She's extremely smart, extremely smart little girl, and she's extremely good at math. But when she was having problems and the teacher was just choosing not to explain it, and the teacher was calling on other people, and then she was being chastised for not keeping up. And so I found I was like, you know what, we're not doing this. We're not doing this. So I went online and I found this absolute rock star of a teacher from Malaysia who has made my daughter fall in love with math. And she's like, my daughter's so excelling, and she's just crushing it right now. And the wild thing is, is that it was simply about having the right person. And it was having a teacher that could see the importance of this. And I think that the teacher in her school had already been, you know, had her own power taken away when it comes to math. And I think that like we need to find people that can be the right mentors for a young woman and not not tolerating or accepting mediocrity, like saying that, you know what? We deserve for the for our daughters to have the absolute best. And how can we help them find that, you know?

SPEAKER_00 40:04

Well, so it's interesting. In the United States, we have a lot of programs focused on um women and and teaching them these life skills. Um, you know, we have um, and I don't know if they have them by you, but we have um junior achievement, we have DECA, we have uh Big Brothers, Big Sisters, we have Girl Scouts. So all of those, and then the one I just told you about, um Rock the Street, Wall Street. So like all these different programs are all focused on that. You should bring them bring them to you, guys, bring them bring them overseas.

SPEAKER_01 40:38

I hope so. I I'm gonna try to figure out what I can do. But the nice part is a lot of these programs do have remote things now, and I'm getting my daughter involved every step of the way and finding to try, trying to find people who can come on and talk to her about cool things, you know? And it this is awesome. But I want to ask you something else because what's something that you've learned from successful woman investors that everyone, men and women alike could benefit from?

SPEAKER_00 41:03

Um, I would say that really successful women think in decades. So every decision that we make is how is this going to affect me 10 years, 20 years, 30 years down the road? So it's certainly playing the long game. It's certainly not the quick, short hit game or you know, zooming out. I always say when you look in the stock market, because you know, there's a lot of fear around losing money in the stock market in a short in the short term. And guess what? You know what? You could lose money in this in the short term, especially if you're emotional or you make the wrong decision and you sell when the market goes down, you're definitely losing money. But guess what? If you zoom out and you think in decades, you're never losing money because nobody loses money in decades in the stock market. Because you when you're zoomed out, you can think clearly and you're not emotional and in that moment.

SPEAKER_01 42:00

So true. It's so true. And I think that that's the powerful thing. Like, can you step back and remove yourself from the emotional response? And that's not easy to do. You know, it is hard to do, but you have to find a way to do it, whether it's Well, and honestly, that's my job.

SPEAKER_00 42:20

So, so for me, that's my job with my clients. That's my most important job is to help them separate out the emotions and not make those terrible emotional decisions that they can never recover from. And if I don't do my job, if I'm not doing my job, then then then they're gonna have negative consequences. So, so I'm very good at my job, thank God. Um, every once I would say in my entire career, maybe 25 years, I've had two people not listening to me. And both times was financial suicide for for for both of those situations.

SPEAKER_01 42:54

Hmm. Well, I want to ask you this. If someone listening today wanted to improve their financial future over the next year, what's the first step you'd tell them to take today?

SPEAKER_00 43:05

Um, I would tell them to start educating themselves on everything that they don't think that they know about. So, like basic personal finance, so budgeting, net worth, um, compounding interest, retirement accounts, um, credit cards, you know, knowing knowing what your FICO score is, knowing um, so that you're making sure that you're saving for uh your financial freedom. So, like every penny that you don't pay in credit card debt or loans is money that goes to you that you can build your financial future with. And to me, financial freedom is having the ability to not work and make more money from your passive investments than you do from your day job. That's financial freedom to me. So that's what everybody should desire.

SPEAKER_01 43:56

I love that. Well, where can people go to find out more about you and what you do?

SPEAKER_00 44:00

Sure. So I'm easy to find. Um, I'm the only person in the whole world with my name, which is Carrie C-A-R-Y, Carbonaro, C-A-R-B-O-N-A-R-O. So I have my own website at carrycabonaro.com. You can find me on LinkedIn, same name, uh, Facebook, Instagram, um, X. I have a TikTok account, but I'm never on it. But I'm really, really easy to find. So um definitely just Google me and you can find me from all all those all those different channels. I have a LinkedIn newsletter you can subscribe to. Um free. That's free. And then I have my my two books are on Amazon or Bundle.