Good Neighbor Podcast: Cooper City
Bringing Together Local Businesses & Neighbors of Cooper City
Good Neighbor Podcast: Cooper City
EP #313: Charmaine Nelson of The Nelson’s Agency
When was the last time you really understood your insurance options? Not the glossy brochure version, but the actual living, breathing benefits that could make a difference in your life today—not just after you're gone?
Charmaine Nelson of The Nelson's Agency shatters common insurance myths in this enlightening conversation that moves far beyond traditional coverage discussions. With 15 years of licensing experience and a passion for education over sales, Charmaine reveals how modern policies offer "living benefits" that allow you to access funds during critical illness or injury—a feature many clients never know exists until they desperately need it.
"I'm here to save lives," Charmaine shares, recounting how a friend with cancer accessed these living benefits to literally save her life. This isn't hyperbole; it's the reality of what properly structured insurance can provide. More surprising is her revelation about timing: "Everyone thinks insurance is for the elderly, but it's actually for when you're healthiest." A 19-year-old client paying just $17 monthly for $150,000 in coverage proves her point dramatically.
The conversation unexpectedly weaves between financial protection and physical health as Charmaine describes her recent running journey. This tangent reveals a profound connection—how proper exercise, even starting with just walking to the end of the block, can transform both physical health and financial options by potentially reducing medication needs and qualifying for better rates. One client eliminated blood pressure medication entirely through consistent walking.
Whether you're considering insurance options, contemplating lifestyle changes, or simply curious about protecting your future, this episode offers refreshing honesty about the intersection of health, wealth, and wellbeing. Connect with Charmaine at thenelsonsagency.com or call 305-563-3932 to continue the conversation. Visit her on instagram at https://www.instagram.com/thenelsonsagency/.
What small step will you take today toward securing your family's future?
This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Jeremy Wolf.
Speaker 2:Well, hello, hello, friends, family, wonderful community. We are back for another round of the Good Neighbor Podcast. Hope everybody is doing well out there, just getting back from a week-long hiatus up in Nashville at a guitar workshop. So I'd be I don't know if I'd be honest in saying that I'm excited to get back to it, but here we are nonetheless ready to rock and roll. Our guest today I'd like to welcome to the show. We have Charmaine Nelson, and Charmaine joins us from the Nelson's agency. Charmaine, welcome to the show.
Speaker 3:Thank you for having me, Jeremy.
Speaker 2:Hey, the pleasure sits all on this side of the table, or something along those lines. At least that's what they say. Anyway, okay, so I do not know. So I'm interested to find out. Tell me a little bit about what you do at the Nelson's agency.
Speaker 3:The Nelson's agency is really an insurance. I'm an insurance broker.
Speaker 2:The.
Speaker 3:Nielsen's agency is really an insurance. I'm an insurance broker, so I sell life insurance, health insurance and I help with Medicare. And I'm a new agent, new business. Been in this thing for about. I've been licensed for 15 years, let's start there, but-.
Speaker 2:Okay, so licensed for 15 years. Licensed 15 years, but you just recently opened your own agency.
Speaker 3:Yes, yes, when COVID happened.
Speaker 2:Well, congratulations.
Speaker 3:I recently opened it. Thank you so much. All right, so I'm going from just a regular insurance broker working with the company to opening my own LLC and starting my own brokerage, because I feel like I can reach my people a lot better and give you guys my expertise, because my mission is always to educate first and then help you empower yourselves and protect families, and I felt like, on the other end, it was always sales based first.
Speaker 2:so education is everything when it comes to insurance absolutely, absolutely, and that's that's a subject that everybody knows of, but everybody knows very little about the details of Exactly, exactly and everyone can use it.
Speaker 3:It's for everybody. Life insurance. You know, if you're you know someone who's just had a baby and you need insurance for your kids, or your spouse or your husband, or let's just transition to like health insurance, or your spouse or your husband or let's just transition to like health insurance. You know, if you're self-employed, don't have any health insurance at all, or if you're transitioning to Medicare, like my parents are right now, I have both of my parents are. I'm helping them sign up for Medicare. This year They'll both be turning 65 and they are overwhelmed with the letters that they get and the phone calls that they get. They get hundreds of phone calls a day and that's where I come in to help you guys educate you guys on what you need to do.
Speaker 2:Love it. Okay, Just open. How long ago did you open your doors? Is this? How recent Is it talking like? Within a year? What's been the time?
Speaker 3:So 2020 when COVID happened? Oh okay, I thought you meant new, like fresh out the gates. All right yeah.
Speaker 2:Oh, okay, so you're not. You're not. I thought you meant new, like fresh out the gates, all right, yeah, oh, several years now, Okay, so don't. All right, okay, so I want to go back to that point. When you're open so 15 years license you make the decision at some point to say, hey, you know what? I want to do this on my own.
Speaker 3:What was one of the biggest challenges that you faced when you made the I call it the entrepreneurial leap, leaping out on faith. So I'm a full-time mom, I have four kids, I have a husband and then, when COVID happened, we were all stuck at home. So imagine this I am at home and my kids' range ranges in different areas, so I have my birth kids and then I have my, my bonus kids, that I call my step kids right all of them are in my house, so my youngest one fun fun was like one and a half, two years old and then from there I had this kindergartner, then I had one starting sixth grade and then I had one starting ninth grade, so I had every level.
Speaker 3:I called myself um the nelson's my home was a school from 8 am to like 4 pm and you have the little one crawling on the kindergarten, the sixth grader. He's not focused, he's, he's looking, but I see him on the phone playing fortnight, I think at the time. And then you have the, the high school, with a night grader who wouldn't even get out of bed. She's like mom, I'm good, I mean, I'm in class, they see me, we don't need our cameras on, so you know she's getting, she's still getting aids. I was like this is insane, that we had lunches and we had like all this stuff going on and bringing back memories, for me now too, right I.
Speaker 3:I had job, a full-time job at the time, but I couldn't really do my job because I had these kids at home, you know. So it's just like they're demanding things from me and the children are demanding things from me. So I was like I need to find something that I can do where I can balance everything. And it's all about balance, right? And my mom told me my mother-in-law is the one who told me to get a health insurance license because she was like you never know when you're going to need this license. It's just a backup plan. And so that's when I was like I need to see what this whole insurance thing is really about with this license. And so I really started.
Speaker 3:You know, I kept up with my continuing education credits and all that stuff just because I didn't want to lose the license. So it was really hard to pass that test, that state test, so I didn't want to lose that. But then I really started getting into it and I started seeing the deaths that was happening around with me. Some were close to home, some of my friends, and everybody was just confused and I was like, okay, this is, this is my, this is what I'm going to use to help people in this work, and I've helped so many people. That's why I just want to help a lot more people.
Speaker 2:Very cool. I want to go back for a moment because there's something I'm a little unclear on, and I'm sure our listeners might be as well that when you said you had the license for 15 years it sounds like you weren't working in the industry. That time is that right as a backstop, essentially just having your back pocket kept up with the continuing education. So what was the? What was the career previously for leading up to this?
Speaker 3:I was working at the University of Miami at the wellness center the gym. Yeah, I went at the gym with all the you know, and when COVID happened, school was closed. No one was going to the gym. So that's what. I was doing previously, and I did that for years, since my daughter was two years old. I was at the wellness center, I was at the gym.
Speaker 2:What would you say has been one of the most rewarding things for you since you made the leap and started the business.
Speaker 3:Oh, time management for one, I'm able to do everything for everybody be my own boss.
Speaker 2:I will say the double edged sword, though, isn't it Sometimes?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I feel like I'm working 23, 24 hours a day, though Like I don't know when I'm sleeping.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 3:I don't know how that is happening. I just wake up, I go, I fall asleep, I wake up and I go again. So I really don't know. I can't really explain how I manage it. I'm a good planner, so I plan everything from 6 am when I wake up to when I go to bed. But I also what was the question? I'm sorry.
Speaker 2:The most rewarding thing about making the leap and going out on your own and starting your own business.
Speaker 3:And that and helping people. So I have an interesting story, a rewarding story, where I had a good friend of mine who got their life insurance with me and I made sure to include living benefits in her package for the insurance and a lot of people don't know about it. But living benefits is. A lot of people feel that life insurance is used when you pass away. Life insurance is used when you pass away and that is not true.
Speaker 3:A lot of people are a heart attack, stroke, you're diagnosed with cancer or something and you cannot work for a minimum of one month up to you know years. You can pull money from your insurance policy to pay for your medical bills. You can feed your family, you can pay your actual bills, like whatever you need to do with that money. You can do it because, no matter what happens to you in life, bills are going to keep happening. Your kids are always going to be hungry, life will keep life and a lot of people don't know that that's something that is built in a lot of insurance policies. Now that you can get for a very, very affordable price, it is not as expensive at all.
Speaker 2:So I'm curious is that something? Living benefits policy? Is that something along the lines of like somewhere between a term policy and a whole policy, or is that?
Speaker 3:it will be. It's included with the term policies.
Speaker 2:Okay, it's just an added benefit of a term, so a little bit more costly.
Speaker 3:but it's a little bit more costly, but it's return benefit and my friend was diagnosed with cancer and she was able to pull out that money and she says it saved her life and that was my first amazing, rewarding story for that. And then I'm like, okay, now I'm on, now I'm on the run Now now I'm going to go vote.
Speaker 2:What a testimonial for you, right. What a testimonial. Yes, I'm here to save my life.
Speaker 3:I have my cape on now, ready to go, ready to fly.
Speaker 2:Oh, you have your cape on, okay, yeah.
Speaker 2:I thought you said my capo on, and if you ever play guitar there's a thing called the capo. I got guitar in my mind because I've been playing the guitar the last week. I want to stick on the topic of education because one of the reasons that we do this show, aside from getting to know local business owners and learn about what they do in their business, is also to clear up some confusion that folks out there have, and I think, to that note, a lot of folks do have confusion about insurance products. Is there something, one or two things that you hear more frequently from your clients and from people you speak with that they're just like things that they believe to be true about insurance, but they were just kind of flat out wrong.
Speaker 3:The first thing that comes to mind is that insurance is only for when you die, and that's true. That's the first myth. It's not Maybe back in the day, when I wasn't born yet I'm an 80s baby but now it is not.
Speaker 1:You can definitely use it while you're living Right 86.
Speaker 2:I beat you. By the way, I'm 80.
Speaker 3:You're 80?. Oh, you're the same age as my older brother, oh yeah, you look good, we look good.
Speaker 2:Thank you. Thank you, yes, you do. Okay, so that's not only for life insurance, is not only for when you die. They're like you mentioned, there's this living benefits.
Speaker 3:uh, other attributes okay and they say people think that it's just for the elderly. For some reason they feel like, oh, they have their whole life to wait to get life insurance and the honest thing is it's for when you are the healthiest. That's when you would get it at the cheapest rate. If you wait until you're old, um, you have to think that the insurance company is gambling on you to for you to pay these premiums and not pass away so you don't have to pay out right like that it's a dirty business.
Speaker 2:I mean gambling on your life right.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's dirty business. That's how I like to put it to people. I say so when you get it, when you're young and you're healthy, your premium premiums will be very cheap. Like I have someone who's 19 right now, who's only paying 17 a month for her insurance, and she has 150 000 right now and she's going to have that premium and that insurance until for 30 years. She chose a 30 year term and then we can obviously like convert that into a whole life policy if needed, but it's very, very cheap for her right now.
Speaker 2:And if you think, and if you think about it, sorry to cut you off there, but if you think about that, like we try to put things into perspective with what, what everything costs nowadays $17 a month I mean I bet you I just did a podcast. I was talking about kind of auditing all of your expenses I guarantee you that many people out there, if you looked at all your credit card bills and your Apple pays, you'd have several things on there way above $17 total that you don't even know you're paying for. That was just like being charged.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, the subscription. I just canceled subscription right now.
Speaker 2:I was paying like $20. You can build two years for this thing. It's crazy 17 bucks a month. I mean it's a wonderful way to secure yourself when you're younger and then when you get older, obviously when you have a family, it's even more important.
Speaker 3:But if you wait until you're 50, right.
Speaker 3:And say you're not as healthy, you're gonna pay a lot of more money. So a lot of people when they I think they start thinking about it when they get older, because now they're thinking about their kids, their grandkids. They wanna leave you know money to them. But now you have to think about when you think insurance is all about age, it's all about health. So if you're a healthy 50 year old, you may get you know like you may spend 30 or $40 a month, maybe a hundred thousand dollars of insurance, just throwing a number out there. But if you are a diabetic, if you you know all these other health risks come at hand, I can shop around for the best price for you and still get you a really good price. But you may not get as much money as you could have when you were younger. If you put in perspective and if you think about it, 17 is what we're spending on mcdonald's right now and then you're hungry again in like three hours and now you're going to go buy something else because everyone uber eats now. So if you're thinking about that and you don't spend over 30, you probably spent 30 on on wing stops.
Speaker 3:I did yesterday Um, and how to deliver. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, I I gotta say, the older I get, the more conscious I become of what I put in my body in terms of food. I mean, like we're, we're just machines and if we wanna operate at a peak performance like you better not only not eat bad foods, but you should be keeping track. And my wife is doing this right now with an exercise program, and I never really thought about it, but I'm watching her do it. You know she's doing, she's counting all her calories, she's doing everything. And it really got me thinking that again, if you're going to perform optimally, you really be tracking all that stuff, and so many of us don't and we just go on the fly. And then we wonder why we have no energy and why we have brain fog all day and why we just don't feel right.
Speaker 3:Think about what we're putting in this food too, cause if you think about it it feels like nothing out there is good for you. Nowadays I've gotten very health conscious too, because I feel like, and it's it gets a little bit more expensive when you start being more health conscious. But I figure I'm either going to pay for it and be healthy now, then when I get older and I get sick, and I'm gonna pay for it later. Either way I'm going to end up paying for it. I'd rather pay for my health now. So I run in the mornings now. I am at the gym a lot more now.
Speaker 2:Did you say you run in the morning?
Speaker 3:I started running in the morning.
Speaker 2:yes, All right. Well, let's stop there for a moment and discuss the running, because I actually caught the runner's bug probably two gosh. I think it's been almost three years now, maybe two to three years ago, and I do. I've become somewhat of an avid runner and I love running, and this is really what opened me up to the idea of taking better care of myself, because what happened was, as I started running, I would be in a lot of pain, like my knees would hurt and I'd have a lot of inflammation, and I wasn't doing any strength training and I wasn't eating particularly well. And now I've shifted and really tried to have a better diet and I started going to the gym. So how long ago did you start running?
Speaker 3:Oh, I'm only like three weeks in. It was really hard.
Speaker 2:You're a newbie.
Speaker 3:I'm a newbie, I'm very new, and some days it's rough boy, but I told my husband to hold me accountable and he has been doing a good job. Now the off, I'm ready to throw that phone across. My legs hurt, they're stiff man like, oh my god. But it feels so amazing once I start. So I'm finding that the hardest thing is getting out of the bed and going. But once I start and come back, my endorphins are good, like I'm hungry and I don't really have a big appetite, but when I exercise, man, I can eat everything in the fridge.
Speaker 3:Um, like and diet. I'm learning even when I was working at the gym diet is 70 of everything. Like what you put in your body and what you are consuming will definitely determine how fast you lose weight and all and all those things that comes with it. And then I also weight train. I do less weights, but I only left weights like three times a week because I'm little, so I'm just trying to tone the game up so I don't need to do too much. Um, but running it clears my mind.
Speaker 3:There's no one out there, so it's early in the day my husband sometimes join me out there and we're running and it's just I don't know, it's just. I feel like we're bonding as a couple too. So it even helps relationship. Everyone should go exercise and work out. It helps your relationship as well. You build together.
Speaker 2:So I've been. We've been taking my wife and I have been going on long walks in the evening and having wonderful, wonderful discussions. It's been. It's been wonderful, almost like therapeutic in many ways, having these discussions while we walk. So how long do you typically run? Now it's only been three weeks. I can't imagine you're. You're going that far like what's your time I'm?
Speaker 3:not one that far. So the first two weeks I go to the track, I go to the chat. So the first two weeks I was I would like run a hundred meter, then I'll walk a hundred meter. Run a hundred meter, walk a hundred meter, because I was not used to it. I was trying to get there, get myself to run. Now, since I'm in week three, I can actually run an 800 without stopping. Then I'll walk the lap and then I'll run an 800. The goal is for me to be able to run at least two miles without stopping.
Speaker 2:I can guarantee you that if you continue you will get there, because that's very similar to my journey. I started out and I would literally run around my block I don't know how far it was, but it wasn't very far and the next time I would go like an extra little section around the block and then another block and then, before I knew it, I was going around the whole neighborhood and then, before I knew that, I was going around. Now I go every Saturday morning. I run with a friend of mine, alex Semide Shout out, dr Semide, semide, dental, you're the best.
Speaker 2:We run every morning Saturday and we do anywhere from like four to 10 miles on Saturday, just depending on how we're feeling. Our max has been 10 miles, which was a lot. It was close to two hours of running, but generally speaking we'll do somewhere around an hour of running. But the you know, generally speaking we'll do somewhere around an hour and those are always the most productive mornings. When I get back, something about running, the continuous cardiovascular exercise, keeping your heart going the longer you go it unlocks deeper levels of just I don't know flood you with these feel-good chemicals. That's why they call it the runner's high yeah, endorphins right yeah.
Speaker 2:I come home every Saturday and it's like I get more done in the next four hours that Saturday morning than I did around the house all week. I do everything. I'm just like, yeah, what can I do next For sure.
Speaker 3:Let's go clean up, let's go. I want to be cluttered today. Finally, that's definitely me. And do you ever feel like when you don't exercise? I know you have to give your body a break it's getting to the point now where I am feeling guilty, like I just be, like maybe I just go and do 10 push-ups or some sit-ups or something, like I feel it like I get this little itch where I need to go work out right now and stop what I'm doing. So I've learned to now just listen to that, which is why I go in the mornings. That way I don't have to interrupt my day because I will. I started interrupting my day. I'd be like oh, I got a break in between clients, let me go exercise Now. I'm running late because I don't forget, lost track of time. Got to get that last set in.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and that's the thing for people out there. You don't necessarily have to just start by going to the gym, Like you said, if you're at work. I do this all the time. I work from home. If I'm doing something and I feel cloudy or stressed out or whatever the case may be, I'll just step aside for a minute and knock out some pushups. I'll just do 10, 20 pushups get the blood flowing. Sometimes I'll step away and just take some deep breaths, do some like a little breathing. Just things like that help me kind of break whatever pattern I'm stuck in. It's so, so important you still look at this. All this talk is making me want to go run and exercise.
Speaker 3:Right, now, look at you, I should join you on these days. I should join you on these days. But, fun fact, I have a lot of clients because I am big at talking about exercise and stuff, and I just had one client tell me that she is off her blood pressure medication because she started walking on a treadmill. How about that? So if you exercise you can get healthier. That way you can get off these medications. You won't feel sicker. She started eating better. So me and my clients actually you know what I should start a little running club, I should. Or walking, we can walk first. We can do a little walking club and I'm just going to invite everybody. We can have a meetup spot. You can come to the ones that run 10 miles, you just go. I'll be with the walkers. We can walk and ride a little bit. I think it'll be good for the environment and the neighborhood.
Speaker 2:Where do you live?
Speaker 3:I am in Miramar. I'm in Broward County.
Speaker 2:That's just funny. Actually, that's where I meet my friend Alex. On Saturday I meet my friend Alex.
Speaker 3:On Saturday I meet him in. Miramar at the Home Depot parking lot off Miramar and Dykes or one of those roads out there west. He lives in Miami Lakes and I live in Cooper City, so we split the difference. I feel like a good middle Maybe.
Speaker 1:I can have me and my husband go.
Speaker 3:I don't know how far I can go. You scared me with those 10 miles. I'm still at 800.
Speaker 2:I'm going to work my way up there. Get me with those those you know, work my way up there. So what you back to? Back to what you just said about getting off the blood blood pressure medication through walking like I 'll also give a testimonial about my wife.
Speaker 2:She felt she hadn't been working out for for many, many years and she was having all sorts of pain in her body. She was complaining for years about how she thinks she needs a hip replacement and her back hurts, all these things, and she was really convinced that there was something like actually wrong with her right, that she was broken. Inside two months of walking every day, starting to exercise, starting to eat right, all of her pains have gone away. So everything in her body that was telling her that there was something wrong with her was basically just inflammation. And then that inflammation feeding the narrative in her head that something was wrong with her and getting stuck in that loop more inflammation, more inflammation, something more wrong with me, and then just continually down that cycle to the point where she may have well gone to get some kind of orthopedic help and then they might have recommended oh, we could do this surgery or that, like you don't even know, and the solution could just be to take better care of your body.
Speaker 3:For most people, exactly something to think about out there if you're struggling with pains just start walking, just just start, and this is what I really try to do too.
Speaker 3:So when you step away, like in my line of business, when you step away from just looking at sales all the time trying to get the next sale, trying to get the next value, trying to get an Excel, and you really educate your clients, and you see them get better, get healthier, you know, and they start understanding, you'll be amazed at how much more prosperous you can be, because they're more thankful now they're, they're giving referrals out, they're referring you to everybody. You know, I don't really have to work that hard. I get phone calls all the time, um, I get invited out to lunches. I don't always go um, but it's nice. It's nice, you know, when they want me to come out, um. But I think I am going to just start inviting people to come walk with me, like this just happened on the jamie will show on good neighbor podcast. I think I am going to officially start inviting people to walk with me.
Speaker 3:We would start walking together, you know, and I think that it's good when you have a partner, an accountability partner, when it comes to exercising um to hold you accountable so you can get what you need to get done because sometimes we all need that that person that's going to be in your ear, like, get your behind up, let's go, we ain't got time for this. I need, I need someone to talk to me, like don't let me whine to you. I need you to be like uh-huh, get up, let's go. I don't even want to hear all that. Let's go, let's get this done. And you're going. City of Miramar and Cooper City, which is going to be the healthiest city in the nation how about?
Speaker 1:that oh yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2:So we've gone on a little bit of a tangent here, but you know it's okay, because this tangent is kind of related to what you do. So this was a good topic of conversation and if one person heard this and it sparks that motivation in them to get moving, well then we've done our work for the day, haven't we?
Speaker 3:We have, we have, and if you need someone, you can reach out to me. I'll be that person.
Speaker 2:Okay, and how can folks do that? Anyone listening that does want to reach out. What is the best way to connect with you, Charmaine?
Speaker 3:Oh, so you can. I'm on social media, so I'm on Facebook. I'm on Instagram at the Nelson's Agency, my business line. I gave the number 305-563-3932. You can always call or text me. If I don't answer, I'm probably with the client, but I definitely will return your call within 24 to 48 hours and you can also visit my website at thenelson'sagencycom, and you can also visit my website at theNelsonAgencycom.
Speaker 2:Perfect, and we will, of course, leave a link in the description to all of your contact information. So anything that you said today resonates with our audience. Reach out. Charmaine is there to help and she is a ray of sunshine and a breath of life in this world. So we're happy to have you on the show to talk a little bit about what you do. It was great to meet you, charmaine, so thanks for joining us.
Speaker 3:Thank you for having me.
Speaker 2:Of course, of course. And to our listeners, thanks as always for tuning in. And if you heard this episode and you're struggling and you're not feeling healthy, start there. That's the one piece of advice I will leave to you, because I saw it firsthand with my wife Just start walking, go out every evening or in the morning and just start, just move. It's very accessible, it's very easy and I guarantee you that if you do that consistently every day, you will start feeling better before you know it.
Speaker 3:So I will leave everyone with that and to add to that just walk to the end of the block and come back.
Speaker 2:Yep, as far as you can go and build on that, all right, everyone, take care. Thanks for joining us and we will catch you next time. Have a good day, bye, bye.
Speaker 1:Thanks for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast, cooper City. Thanks for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast, cooper City. To nominate your favorite local business to be featured on the show, go to GNPCooperCitycom. That's GNPCooperCitycom, or call 954-231-3170.