The Veterans Growing America Podcast

Avis Savage | ASIC Strategies for Life | Veterans Growing America

• Donnell Johns & Coach R.L. Simmons

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0:00 | 27:46

In this episode of the Veterans Growing America Podcast, Coach R.L. Simmons and Donnell Johns sit down with Army veteran and financial educator Avis Savage, Founder & CEO of ASIC Strategies for Life.

Avis shares her path from serving eight years on active duty to building a mission around helping individuals understand money, eliminate confusion, and prepare for retirement with clarity. She breaks down why so many “successful” and high-income professionals still don’t truly know where their money is going—and why financial confidence starts with awareness, not intimidation.

This conversation is practical and straight to the point: tracking cash flow, understanding compounding, leveraging assets, and building a strategy that protects wealth while positioning you to grow it. Avis also explains why insurance can be more than a legacy tool and how certain strategies can create tax-advantaged opportunities when structured correctly.

If you’ve ever felt behind, overwhelmed, or unsure about the next financial move, this episode gives you a starting point—and a direction.

Topics covered:

  • How military discipline and organization translate into business success
  • Why most people don’t actually know their cash flow (even high earners)
  • Compounding, leveraging, and dual-purpose strategies explained simply
  • Why “not all debt is bad” and how to think in assets vs. liabilities
  • The power of free consultations and asking the right questions early
  • Building retirement readiness and protecting wealth the smart way
  • How Veterans Growing America supports veteran entrepreneurs through community and opportunity

Connect with Avis Savage (ASIC Strategies for Life):

Connect with the hosts:
Coach R.L. Simmons (YourMoneyGOAT)

  • Simplifying finances from A to Z: budgeting, protection, strategy, and leverage
  • Website: yourmoneygoat.com (sign up for a free financial audit)

Veterans Growing America (VGA)

  • Website: veteransgrowingamerica.com
  • Find veteran-owned businesses in the directory
  • Visit the VGA Marketplace: 14901 Potomac Town Place, Suite 110, Woodbridge, VA (Stonebridge at Potomac Town Center)

Like, subscribe, and share this episode with someone who needs financial clarity and a real plan

SPEAKER_04

Welcome, welcome, welcome to the Veterans Growing America podcast. I am Ariel Sendens. I'm here with my illustrious co-host Dominelle Jones, and we have another special guest for you today. We have Miss Avis Sabbath. She is the founder and CEO of ASIC Strategies for Life, an Army Veteran. Welcome to the show, young lady.

SPEAKER_03

Thank you. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01

Avis, Avis, Avis. It's so good to have you on the podcast. You know, I know you, but the audience wants to get to know you. Can you tell them a little bit about you and your military experience and background?

SPEAKER_02

Sure. First of all, thank you for the invitation. I sincerely appreciate it. Um again, my name is Avis Savage. I'm an Army veteran. I did eight years of active duty service. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I um accumulated a lot of experience and experience and met a lot of great people while I was in the military. So it was a very positive thing for me. Uh since I've been out of the military, my background has been in an appraiser and now in uh wealth accumulation for individuals. So uh Darnell and I met at VGA, and I had an opportunity to set up at his one of his locations, and we communicated, found out we knew each other uh when we were in the military. So that kind of strengthened, you know, whatever our bond or whatever. He's been very helpful. Um, the VGA is very, very good at helping young entrepreneurs get started and supporting them, and I appreciate VGA for that.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, that's amazing. Can you tell me a little bit about how your time in the military influenced your journey into entrepreneurship?

SPEAKER_02

Well, in all honesty, I was pretty much an entrepreneur before I went in the military. I just have always wanted to, I want always wanted to go in. I had planned on going in the military in the delayed entry program, uh, but that kind of got thwarted, and then I went later on in life. Excuse me. Um, like I said, entrepreneurship has always been a part of me. That was one of the reasons why I enlisted was to allow me to use the GI Bill so I could become a real estate impress uh uh um investor. So um being in the military has exposed me to a lot of things and kind of brought me to where I am now uh in helping individuals understand their finances.

SPEAKER_03

I can't hear.

SPEAKER_01

So you you said that you know before you joined the military, you were an entrepreneur. Yes. So where did you get that entrepreneurial bug? You know, where did that come from?

SPEAKER_02

I want to be very honest with you, I really don't know. I've always been into being an independent business owner. In fact, when I was in high school, I know somebody might not be able to do that. No, I was a direct response for Amber. And I had not even graduated from high school, I gave up basketball in order to pursue that.

SPEAKER_03

So I've always had an entrepreneurial spirit.

SPEAKER_02

You spin your circles, you did your uh presentation for SAH and LOC, which were their two largest products, and it's probably still one of their two larger products. They're known for the SAH and LOC. They've of course branched out into other things, but yeah.

SPEAKER_01

And then from there, you joined the military after that, or what what was that transition like into entrepreneurship? I mean, from that, and then what was next when it came to entrepreneurship?

SPEAKER_02

Um, the next thing I did prior to coming into the military was um I've always had approach a business on the side, so I did that as well. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03

Nice.

SPEAKER_04

Tell us a little bit about ASIC Strategy for Life, as unique business proposition.

SPEAKER_02

Well, ASIC Strategy for Life was developed because um I'm a woman of a certain age, right? So I was looking at retirement, and uh I began to say, okay, what do I need to do to prepare? Right. And uh I was really shocked by what I did not know, right? So once I learned the path of what I should be doing in order to prepare for retirement and just accumulate wealth and protect my assets, I decided that I would become a licensed person in order to do that and assist other people in learning what to do and how to manage things and prepare for retirement in general.

SPEAKER_01

So, what what are some of your favorite uh I know you said that you're in financial services. Uh give us a little uh a little class real quick on if I was a uh a person that didn't know anything about finances, give me some you know, some key things that you would recommend to someone that's just now starting out in the in the finance industry.

SPEAKER_02

Just starting in the industry or just people in general?

SPEAKER_01

People in general.

SPEAKER_02

People in general. I think one thing that I've learned in my journey doing this is that people don't have a good hold on their finances. They don't know what's coming in their house, they don't know where it's going, they uh because fortunately I've I mean I deal with a lot of people, right? But I deal with a lot of upwardly mobile people. So they have disposable income. They're not so uh living paycheck to paycheck. I'm not trying to explain. So for them to spend something is nothing for them, right? But a lot of them do not know where their money is going, they're not aware of what they're paying in interest, they're not aware of the type of debt that they're in, what they need to do to get out of that debt, what they need to do to prepare for retirement. That what they have is not necessarily a retirement vehicle, it's a way to accumulate money. They're not aware of what the tax situation is gonna be on these uh deferred tax savings plans, 401, 403, 457, things of that nature. Um the best thing I can tell, the first thing I can tell people to do is know what your finances are. What are you invested in? Do you have old 401ks? Do you only have a 401k for retirement? Because that's something that's gonna be taxed. And there you need to know how that is going to relate to your Social Security. You're gonna need to eventually know how that's gonna relate to your Medicare and Medicaid. So another thing, too, is there are principles, there are three three principles that I like to talk about: compounding, leveraging, and dual purposing. Because people are not aware that if your money is sitting in the bank, it's working for the bank, it's not working for you. In order for you to accumulate wealth, money needs to grow. It needs to move. And having it sit in a bank safely is not really benefiting you, right? If you look at what the average rate of return on a savings account is, we're talking about what, 1%? Let's say two. Let's say high yield is five, right? But oftentimes, what is our inflation rate and how does that cut into your savings if you're not doing something to really build, right? So know what your finances are and aren't doing for you. Know what compound interest is. Because if uh, you know, the old in in the financial industry, there's this thing that uh compounding interest is one of the eight wonders of the world, right? If you're not paying it, if you're not earning it, you're paying it. So you need to be on the side of earning it, right? Leveraging your money, using other people's money in order to generate money for you. You know, everybody says that debt is bad. Not all debt is bad, right? If your debt is built on asset producing things, your debt is good. If your debt is just built on credit cards because you like things, and don't get me wrong, I understand you work hard and you like things, right? But these things are not going to prepare you to live the rest of your life if all you're doing is spending your money on wasted things that are liabilities that are not assets. A lot of people don't know that their home is not necessarily an asset. You know what I'm saying? Anything that is not paying you back and not earning you cash, right, is a liability. So we work and we save so much to get our homes, but we don't know how to use them as an asset. All right. That interest is the quickest way to get yourself get yourself to a point where you can really accumulate wealth.

SPEAKER_04

I love that. Right up my alley. I love it. Uh what type of services do you offer to clients?

SPEAKER_02

Okay, so I'm a post is independent broker on insurance. Okay, so I help individuals understand how to accumulate wealth, how to protect that wealth, and how to prepare for retirement. So vehicles for families, like, excuse me, everybody talks about index universal life. Well, it's the reason why they talk about index universal life policies, because uh the the sad thing that people don't realize is insurance is a wealth-building vehicle. Okay, it is not just meant for a legacy. You can use insurance because it's under a special tax code 7702 that allows you to accumulate wealth in a tax-free and a penalty-free environment. So that is what I usually operate in. Most of the vehicles that I offer are under that tax code.

SPEAKER_03

I love it. Okay, okay.

SPEAKER_01

So I love that you shared that, but when we had a uh a class, there was another vehicle that you were talking about. Um, because I brought up to you um the IUL when it came to um what is it called? Uh Be Your Own Bank, but you was like, hold on, there's another one.

SPEAKER_02

There are several. There are, I mean, you know, there are several strategies, right? These are strategies. It's called reverse banking. So one of the presentations that I did for you, I showed you how to, I showed you how the bank uses your money, and then how you can use that money to accumulate wealth yourself, to empower yourself. There's a another term, another strategy, infinite banking, right? That's where you become your own bank. You take over your finance as you perform the banking, uh, the banking for yourself. Okay. Being the owner, uh be your own bank is excuse me, you're talking about BTE, uh, being able to actually invest in commercial projects and get a hefty return on that investment.

SPEAKER_01

Well, this is powerful stuff. This is powerful stuff. And, you know, we're speaking to, you know, both of you guys as Wheelhouse. Um what made you get into this industry? Why was it I know you you talked about it before, but why was it so um inviting to you?

SPEAKER_02

Because I I didn't know what I didn't know until it was time for me to almost retire. When I figured that out, I knew there were many other people in my circumstance. I worked with them, right? And for much of the things that I do now, even today, when I do uh consultations, people are like, well, if these things are available, how can they not really talk to them? I can't answer that question. But they are there. And I enjoy the opportunity to work with younger individuals. I work with everybody, don't get me wrong, right? But I enjoy the opportunity to work with younger individuals so they don't run into the same obstacles that we run into as we get older and we did not know for lack of knowledge. And for older people like myself, when I came to this knowledge, to be able to help them move through and prepare better for retirement.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, that's coming. That's coming. I I've been in retirement now for the last 10 years, which is good.

SPEAKER_03

For real, for real. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

Hey, can you tell me one of those things that you're sitting down with a client that you're most shocked to hear about what's going on with their finances?

SPEAKER_02

I'm gonna be honest with you.

SPEAKER_03

What really shocks me is the, like I said, the affluent having no clue of what is out there because you go to the table and you say, you know, this person does this and this person that does that.

SPEAKER_02

I give you just assume that they know, but they don't know. I'm working there several people right now. There's a worksheet. I do a I do a free consultation first of all, because I don't I think you cannot make an educated decision without having all of the information, right? So when I do a free consultation, I do a full presentation. We sit down, we talk about your finances, where is your money, right? And based on that, I'll come back and we can discuss. Now, I'm I I'm I'm not a pushy person, right? But based on what you tell me that your goals are, I will make suggestions, and of course, you as the client will decide what you need to do if you need to do anything. But I pride myself on educating people because what is what I feel is missing in society is financial education.

SPEAKER_01

So let's transition a little bit to um what so you spent eight years in the military.

SPEAKER_02

Yes.

SPEAKER_01

What did you learn from the military that you transferred over to the business world?

SPEAKER_02

Uh organization. Organization. Um what that is one that I think that's one of the things that I think the military is very good in teaching is organization and discipline. Right? Um I brought that over. And uh always in a level people, so I can't really say that. Um but organization and discipline, I think those are the two things that I really would say that the stock of the military really helped me out and helps me even right in.

SPEAKER_01

You don't have a business, you have a job.

SPEAKER_02

Exactly. I agree.

SPEAKER_04

Operating your business um and you take a step back and see who you are. What is your superpower?

SPEAKER_02

My superpower? Um the ability, my I think my superpower power is my ability to communicate with pretty much anybody. I can walk up and I can start a conversation with anyone, and I enjoy it. You know what I'm saying? I enjoy meeting people, I enjoy learning about their cultures and their backgrounds and things of that nature. So I think my simple power is kind of like just being a people person and having a genuine interest in how individuals are.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I I concur with that. Um, I've seen you have a real interest uh in people, you know. Uh, and you really too, you really do care about people and you do care about supporting them and trying to help them get where they need to be. Uh and it and it translates. So I love that.

SPEAKER_02

Thank you.

SPEAKER_01

I do want to ask another question about veterans growing America.

SPEAKER_02

Yes.

SPEAKER_01

So we pride ourselves in the in our culture uh and making sure that it's a safe place for entrepreneurs. Can you tell people about your uh experience with Veterans Growing America?

SPEAKER_02

Of course. Um, my experience with Veterans Growing America is the camaraderie, the support. I don't think you will well, excuse me, stop. I have not found that in another organization that I've been affiliated with. From the first day that I signed up, all of the vendors there were very helpful. They were very knowledgeable, they were willing to share their knowledge and to be of an assistant. There were other um I don't want to say let me see. There were other incentives like um what was the website we are now called The Directory the Directory and the membership and things of that nature. So Veterans Four in America is a very unique organization in that it was built to help veterans, right? And um it's just been my experience that they are very supportive of the veterans that are part of VGA or veterans that just come there for help and information in general. I think he's done a wonderful job, and that's ended by a lot of the recognition that the organization has received over the years.

SPEAKER_01

We appreciate that. We appreciate you being a member of our organization, and you've added you've added tremendous value um to our organization. Thank you. Uh and uh not only to our members, but anyone that um tunes into when they tune into this podcast, they're gonna get great information.

SPEAKER_02

Thank you.

SPEAKER_01

I remember um you gave your first class and we went live. Yeah. And every person that's that jumped on stayed on the entire time. And that's hard to do in finances.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

That is really hard to do when you're talking about money. And they were asking questions uh on the um on on the what is it? I think it was Instagram that we were live on. Yeah, they were asking questions like crazy. It was like, oh, like they were really interested in learning the knowledge that you share. So I want to thank you for giving back your knowledge to, you know, the community all the way around.

SPEAKER_02

Thank you. I I and the reason why I approach it the way that I do is because finances is kind of overwhelming for most people. However, if we put it in a way that is the way for them to understand, that's not threatening, that invites their questions, you know, so they don't feel like, well, I I I should know this already. It's always, in my opinion, it's always best to be related, especially in a in a in a situation where that can be sensitive. Sensitive, you know, people's finances are sensitive. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, 100%.

SPEAKER_04

So first of all, I want to thank you for your time and your expertise. Truly, truly appreciate it. Um, before we close out this show, I want to give you the opportunity to speak to the listeners and the watchers. Um say maybe um potential entrepreneurs, they maybe someone is interested in finances.

SPEAKER_03

Give them some of your good knowledge so we can close out the shit. Some good knowledge. Good knowledge, good knowledge.

SPEAKER_02

Okay, purely selfish. This is purely selfish. Have a free consultation with someone who knows how to answer your questions, how to help guide you through some of the things that you need to do. Because never be intimidated when it comes to your finances. Never. I don't care where you are or where you think you are, you should always have that conversation about your finances. Sit down with a professional that can walk you through, answer your questions, and then you'd be more careful. I mean, be more prepared. And it's not just being prepared for yourself. A lot of us have sons, we have daughters, we've got nieces, we have nephews, and being able to pass that knowledge on to them when they're younger, that is very valuable. That's very valuable. So, my my last thing is to sit down with someone, ask the questions that you have, see if your path is where you really want to go and want to be on, and then you know, move over from there, move on from there.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, I love that.

SPEAKER_04

Uh all right, before we go, how do the people get a hold of you? Can you share your socials and website or anything where people can actually get a hold of you?

SPEAKER_02

Okay. So I said before, I'm ASIC Strategies for Life on Instagram. I'm ASIC Strategies for Life on um Facebook, and I'm ASIC Strategies.com. Okay. www.asicstrategies.com. But if you get in touch with VGA, right, they can also have information as well.

SPEAKER_04

I love that. Don, how do people continue to support?

SPEAKER_01

Well, that's a that's an easy question right there. First, I want to pass the ball over to you so they can get in touch with you. And then we can talk a little bit about me. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_04

I definitely don't want to steal your thunder, but I do the same thing. What I do is I simple fully finances for people's A to Z. So you want to talk about budget, you want to talk about protection, you want to talk about leverage, or you don't know where to start. Our language is very intentional to ensure that you get it to where you want to be on your financial career. So you go to your money dot com and sign up.

SPEAKER_01

You can do nothing but win. And plus both of them are members of VGA. You can find both of them on the Veterans Growing America directory. If you need any type of support or service, please go to our website, veteransgrowing America.com, and that can help you with resources that also can connect you with veterans, military spouses, and independents that have businesses. And then you could also stop by our store in Woodbridge, Virginia at 14901 Potomac Town Play Suite 110 in Stone Bridge at Potomac Town Center and come in. Shop, baby.

SPEAKER_04

Again, Avis, thank you, thank you, thank you for joining us. We are over in the house.