Participants: Yvonne Lewis (Host), Ryan Mack
Series Code: DAS
Program Code: DAS000012S
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00:27 Hello, and welcome to Dollars and Sense.
00:30 My name is Yvonne Lewis, and I'm the co-host for this program. 00:34 Our primary host is Ryan Mack, Financial Literacy expert. 00:38 He's an author, a speaker, and he has been just schooling us on 00:46 this program. And today we have Episode 2, Part 2 of credit. 00:51 Yes, exactly. And we're going to talk about the importance of 00:54 credit, getting good credit, all of that. 00:56 And you have such... Part 1 was so good. 00:59 If you didn't get Part 1, if you didn't watch it before, 01:02 you've got to get it because it is really good. 01:06 You're going to learn a lot. 01:07 And share it with your friends and family. 01:08 Tell them to tune in to Dollars and Sense. 01:11 There's so much information on this program. 01:13 You're not going to miss it. 01:14 We had a great time. 01:16 And, just a little recap. 01:19 We went over how gentrification ties into good credit, 01:24 or good credit ties into gentrification. 01:26 And for those who don't know what gentrification is? 01:28 Essentially it is individuals who are of better economic 01:32 means, who are able to move into a depressed value community. 01:37 And those who are living in the community might be priced out. 01:41 Because as individuals move in who could afford to pay more, 01:44 prices start going up. 01:45 They're being priced out. 01:46 Then they have to move out. 01:48 So we talked about how it's not a black, or brown, or white 01:51 thing, it is a green thing. 01:52 And so as individuals with good credit having access to 01:56 capital in this economy, we have to make sure that we understand, 02:02 fully understand that there's liquidity. 02:04 Having a lot of money and good credit will allow us to be 02:07 able to purchase property. 02:09 Many people living in urban areas, and rural America, 02:12 and Appalachia, might not have a lot of liquidity, 02:16 but they can get good credit. 02:18 So that will allow them to be able to purchase property, 02:20 stopping gentrification, and take more ownership 02:23 in their communities. 02:25 And when you see, we talked about last time how crime rates, 02:30 poverty rates, substance abuse rates, all that, 02:34 it correlates with credit, and not necessarily directly. 02:39 But because those practices that you have in terms of paying your 02:42 bills on time, being able to... 02:44 That translates into access to capital, being able to purchase 02:47 homes, having bank accounts, start businesses, 02:50 purchase businesses, taking out loans. 02:52 All of that translates into a more wealthy community, 02:56 and it translates into lower poverty rates, 02:58 lower crime rates, lower substance abuse rates. 03:00 And so if you look at where a lot of unrest, economic unrest, 03:05 are in the country, you'll see many of those communities are 03:10 lower credit score communities. 03:11 So we really have to focus on this. 03:13 This is bigger than what people think. 03:15 It's bigger than people believe. 03:17 It's something that's traditionally, 03:19 by the mainstream, swept under the rug. 03:22 And we talked about, most importantly, that it's directly 03:26 related to the word of God. 03:28 It's directly related to Christ. 03:30 We read in Deuteronomy how the FCRA, Fair Credit Rights, 03:36 their sharing is directly from Deuteronomy. 03:40 And so, and it's almost as if they did it word for word 03:46 from the Bible. Uh huh. 03:48 So the influence of faith and Christian faith on our laws 03:53 of society is inside of me. 03:55 But it's very interesting to me how they take that principles 03:58 of good credit, and integrity from the Bible, 04:01 and they implement them in our laws. 04:03 And so we must walk by them. Yes. 04:06 We must follow them. 04:07 And so we have a verse for today, Romans 13:8. 04:12 I love this verse. I've said this verse a few times. 04:16 But I think this verse definitely bears repeating. 04:18 It says: 04:27 And that first part of it, Owe no man anything, and it says, 04:32 I mean the word of Christ, it talks a lot about debt, 04:36 and being a borrower, being a lender. 04:39 And one's the head and one's the tail. 04:41 It talks a lot about that. 04:43 It talks about putting yourself in a position of power. 04:45 And we talked last week about righteousness, 04:47 and how in Proverbs it talks about having righteousness, 04:51 having integrity, and measuring being either 04:54 wicked or righteous. 04:55 FICO, FIR ASIC Corporation, is the measure from 350 to 850 05:01 that really discerns how righteous an individual has 05:05 been, or how wicked they have been by not paying off. 05:08 By nature, Leroich is financially wicked. 05:10 Exactly! Right, right. 05:12 And, so, I mean, it just to me, and I guess I'm a Bible nerd, 05:16 but it just is very, it's intriguing to me. 05:20 It's very interesting, and exciting all at the same time, 05:23 how so many things correlate with the word of God. 05:26 And again, it just continues to prove how timeless it is, 05:30 and how relevant it is, and how pertinent it is to being able to 05:33 make sure that we can walk the path of righteousness within our 05:36 credit and every other area, but this particular 05:38 program about our credit. 05:42 So it goes from 350 to 850 FIR ASIC Corporation 05:46 and how they measure. 05:48 We talked about that, but what we didn't say 05:49 was what each rating was. 05:52 So 619 and under is poor credit, 620 to 679 is below average, 05:58 680 to 719 is average, 720 to 749 is good, 06:05 and 750 plus is great or excellent credit. 06:08 So, I mean obviously, ideally we are able to work, continue to 06:14 work our way up, continue to check our credit scores. 06:17 We talked about Credit Karma being a great source to... 06:20 I have a lot of friends who are at Credit Karma. 06:22 And it's free. It's free; free of charge. 06:24 Totally free. Yes, so... It's an app. 06:27 Yeah. It is. Just put it on your phone and you can check your 06:30 credit all of the time. 06:31 And there really is no excuse now for us to 06:36 not have good credit. Yeah. 06:37 Unless we just don't feel like being righteous. 06:40 Yeah! Right! Unless we just intentionally, 06:44 because we can with so much free help: 06:45 Operation Hope has free assistance, 06:47 National Foundation of Credit Councils has free assistance, 06:50 Credit Karma free assistance. 06:51 You can get a free credit report from annualcreditreport. com 06:55 once a year; free assistance. 06:57 You should never have to pay a dime on any of this. 07:00 Please, if someone comes up to you and says, Pay me $600 07:06 and I'll improve your credit. 07:07 Run as fast as you can away from them. 07:11 Do not pay a dollar to improve your credit. 07:13 There's too many free resources out there 07:15 to get your credit repaired. 07:17 So I actually have seven steps to how to repair your credit. 07:21 Oh great! In addition we talked about the breakdown last week. 07:25 I guess I'll go over that again briefly. Yeah. 07:28 35% is the regular paying your bills on time. 07:30 Now this is how to raise your credit? 07:33 Yeah, well, this is how the FIR as a corporation 07:35 calculates your credit score. 07:37 Oh, okay, so this is how the credit score is calculated. 07:39 35% is the record of paying your bills on time. 07:42 30% is your balance to your lending limit ratio. 07:45 Remember, don't cancel accounts. 07:48 It lowers that ratio and makes it less favorable, 07:51 and lowers your credit score. 07:52 15% is your length of credit history. 07:55 The more points of data that you have... 07:57 This why your oldest credit card is the most 08:00 favorable credit card. 08:02 Because the FIR ASIC Corporation has more points of data 08:04 to measure how responsible you've been in that. 08:06 So if you want to cancel any... If you have to cancel the credit 08:09 card don't cancel the oldest one. 08:12 Cancel the newest one first. 08:14 Well that's a great tip. Yes. 08:16 That's a great tip. 08:17 If you have to cancel one don't cancel the oldest one. 08:20 Because they check out your history; the length of time. 08:24 That is one of the categories on my Credit Karma thing. Yep. 08:28 The length of time that you've had the credit cards. 08:31 Exactly. Well, 15% of your FICO score is 08:33 length of credit history. 08:35 So that measures into points of data that they can use to 08:38 gather how responsible you've been in paying off credit cards. 08:41 10% of your FICO score is account inquiries. 08:44 So every time you fill out a credit card application 08:48 you essentially will get 5 to 6 points dinged 08:52 off your credit score, even if you don't get the credit card. 08:55 That seems so unfair to me. 08:56 Yep. Just because somebody's looking into your credit, 08:59 you get penalized for that. Right. 09:01 You apply for a card; you get penalized for that. 09:04 Exactly. Well, they view that as you're taking on more risk. 09:08 So as you take on more risk they're going to decrease your 09:11 financial score in order to compensate for that additional 09:15 risk that you're taking on. 09:16 That's how they categorize it. 09:17 Now there's a hard hit, and there's a soft hit. 09:21 The hard hit is when someone actually... 09:23 You apply for credit, and you're actually trying to get 09:25 additional lending. 09:27 The soft hit is when someone gets... sold your information. 09:33 And they want to solicit you to get a Visa or a Master Card. 09:37 They have a good deal, and they see that you've taken out 09:42 various things before. 09:43 And they've looked at your credit report to see is she, 09:46 or he a good candidate? 09:48 Then, you know what, let's send her an application to see if she 09:51 wants to get this credit card. 09:53 Well that's a soft hit, and that shows up on your credit report. 09:56 When you go to annual credit report it will show all the 09:59 individuals who are looking at your credit report for potential 10:03 solicitation of business. 10:04 That does not impact your credit card, your credit report. 10:07 So just be mindful of that. 10:10 You know, be mindful of different lists that you're on. 10:13 I mean we've talked a little bit about identity theft. 10:15 We'll be getting into that today. 10:17 So be mindful of all... 10:18 I mean your information is just floating around. 10:21 There's the onslaught of information, and access to that 10:25 that we have today is easier today than it's ever been 10:29 which causes us to have... more prone be... to have our higher 10:33 information stolen from us. 10:34 But it also, on the positive side, it allows us to access 10:38 data a lot easier, because FIR ASIC Corporation has gotten 10:42 a lot when I got into this in 2003, or 2002 or 3, 10:47 and really started researching how, and actually created a 10:50 bankruptcy course in 2005. 10:54 So since then the FIR ASIC Corporation has gotten a lot 10:58 more lenient in how they are revealing their data, 11:02 and how they're measuring credit. 11:04 And so, I mean things are on the up and up. 11:07 But again, that is also readily available as well. 11:10 So ready for the seven steps to...? 11:12 Yeah! Oh, absolutely! 11:15 Alright. So step one is basic housekeeping. Okay? 11:21 Basic housekeeping says that 75% of your credit report 11:25 has errors on them. 11:26 So you want to make sure that the first thing you do is go, 11:30 go to annualcreditreport. com pull off of your credit report 11:35 get your frequent report, look at it and see if there's 11:38 any errors on them. 11:39 You're going to find some, more than likely. 11:41 Most reports have errors. 11:43 It could be a wrong name. 11:44 It could be a wrong address. 11:45 It could be, Oh, now those are trivial, or maybe not, 11:50 because they might not be able to get access to send you a bill 11:53 that is late, in terms of the credit bureau. 11:54 So it may or may not be trivial. 11:57 But for those, if when you get that data correct it 12:01 as fast as possible. 12:02 Dispute all items that you want to remove. 12:05 Those small balances, you'd be amazed; 12:09 on those small balances you might have owned, 12:12 or you had a gym membership from two years ago. 12:15 And it was $20, or $30 that you owed on that gym membership. 12:19 Or a cable bill, or something that was very trivial. 12:22 And it's still on your report. 12:23 Go ahead and pay it down. 12:25 Pay it off. It gets off your report. 12:28 It raises your score up very quickly. 12:30 For those larger accounts, and again it all depends on the 12:33 subjective and what is large for you and what is not. 12:37 But maybe it's a $100 or more, or maybe $500 or more. 12:40 But for those larger accounts you want to start to organize. 12:43 We're going to have a segment on debt as well. 12:45 On how to organize your debt and pay it off in the 12:47 most responsible way. 12:49 And that's when you want to put it into that category. 12:51 But for those small things, go ahead and pay those off. 12:53 So that's Step 1. This is basic housekeeping. 12:56 Step 2. Pay bills on time. 12:58 That's automatic bill payment. 13:01 You know, make sure that you are setting up a budget 13:05 within your household. 13:07 Automatic bill payment can be very dangerous if you don't 13:09 have a budget, and you don't know what your balance is. 13:11 So I've seen many individuals who they've over drafted various 13:16 accounts because they just didn't know that they only had 13:19 $10 or $30 left in their account, and they allowed a 13:22 $50 charge come through through automatic bill payment. 13:25 So let's just make sure that if you set up automatic bill 13:28 payment you have a budget, a working budget in your 13:31 household, and you're using it, okay? 13:33 Step 3. Pay down old debts. 13:36 Carrying balance serves no purpose. 13:38 And avoid being seduced with special offers. 13:41 There's a lot of various offers that are always floating around. 13:46 There are different ways, and as a matter of fact Google, 13:50 AdSense, and all these organizations have ways 13:52 that they sell your information to these debtors. 13:54 This is a way they make money. 13:56 So you might be, you can go and you purchase something 14:00 with one thing, and they'll say, Wow, they're using that credit 14:02 card at this store, that store. 14:04 Let's send them this credit card for that store. 14:07 And the reason that they sent these, credit cards work so well 14:11 is that we have a propensity to spend an additional 35% more 14:14 money with plastic than we do with cash. 14:17 And it's the same thing. 14:19 And, like for instance in most casinos, 14:22 they want to take all your money. 14:24 They want to give you plastic, and they want to give you chips, 14:28 because it doesn't feel like you're spending money. 14:29 There's little tricks they give. 14:31 The more chips they give you, you're just spending all this 14:34 money, and that's the same concept with a credit card. 14:37 It doesn't feel like you're spending money. 14:39 You're taking that and you're swiping it, 14:40 and you're spending money. 14:41 By the end of the day you don't know that you've spent 2 to $300 14:44 at the store or what have you. 14:46 So we want to make sure that we are not being 14:49 seduced by these offers. 14:51 And every time we get a credit card we're getting them with a 14:54 lot of thought behind it. 14:55 And there is an do you need that card? 14:57 Is it adding to be a component of your emergency fund? 15:00 Are we going to be able to use it wisely? 15:03 All those things are being, should be thought as opposed to, 15:06 Oh wow, this happens to be a good offer at the particular 15:09 time, so let me get this credit card. So! 15:11 Now 4. is don't cancel old accounts. 15:16 Again, 15% of your FICO Score is your length of credit history. 15:20 The points of data on your older accounts are more plentiful 15:24 than the newer ones. 15:25 So they're more valuable in terms of calculating what your 15:28 FICO Score is, and 30% is your debt to lamellate ratios. 15:32 So as you cancel accounts you're actually lowering your FICO 15:36 Score because they're viewing you as having less 15:39 ability to take on risk. 15:41 Then you have Step 5. Don't fear credit counselors. 15:45 Now free ones, free credit counselors, for the paid ones 15:51 again, run as far away from them as possible. 15:54 But everyone, I use credit counselors. 15:56 I go to Operation Hope. 15:58 And I just go by and I say, Hey, you know what, Crystal Nixon 16:01 who I've worked with, I say, Listen, pull my credit score up. 16:07 Pull my credit score up. 16:08 Make sure I get a free credit report. 16:10 And she pulls it up on the spot. 16:11 And I check out my identity. 16:13 If I have any identity theft, which we're going to talk about, 16:15 and she says, Nope, Ryan, everything's good. 16:18 And I walk away. It's just that simple. 16:20 So there really is no income level for you having them 16:23 check your credit scores, especially if 16:25 it's a free service. 16:26 So, I mean, Operation Hope, Green Pass, National Foundation 16:29 Credit Counselors, all these are offering free services that 16:33 we should be utilizing. 16:34 They're there. They want to use them. 16:36 They have to get numbers. 16:37 I mean these, they're being paid by their funders, 16:40 based upon the numbers of people that they serve. 16:42 Meanwhile we're not using them. 16:44 So I think that especially in those communities where the 16:48 average credit scores are very low, we should definitely be 16:51 having our own campaigns to say, You know what, hey let's go to 16:55 this church, let's go to this business, let's go to this 17:00 community based organization. 17:01 And then make sure all of their members, all of their employees, 17:04 know about these services in this community. 17:07 So we can all use and take access to these services. So... 17:12 And then we have Step 6. Steer clear of bankruptcy. 17:16 Again, as it said from the onset, Romans 13:8, Owe no one 17:21 anything except to love each other. 17:23 For the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. 17:25 I believe in this principle. 17:28 I think it's one that when ever you're thinking about whether 17:31 that you want to pay back a debt or not, just look at Romans 17:35 13:8. I think it's pretty clear, owe no one anything. 17:40 If you owe it, even if they say, You know what, Ryan... 17:44 Now if they say it's forgiven, okay, that's one thing, okay? 17:49 But if you owe it pay it. 17:52 And that's just one way of integrity, 17:54 again, as we walk with integrity. 17:56 Then we'll be able to, and the Scripture talks 17:58 about that as well. 18:00 And then lastly, this is important, 18:01 we've got to be patient. 18:03 Because a lot of time we're looking for, and we can in many 18:06 instances get an instant response if we dispute items, 18:10 and remove items from our report. 18:12 But we've got to be patient. 18:14 And I've seen a lot of individuals get succored into 18:18 paying $600 on this paid for services just because they can 18:21 promise, falsely promise that they're going to do something 18:24 more than what these seven steps are doing. 18:27 If you just do these seven steps, this is exactly what 18:30 any paid for service is going to be doing. 18:32 They might be able to write some letters. 18:35 Like you can get from free letters written on your behalf. 18:37 They might write a letter on your behalf. 18:38 They might make a call on your behalf to a creditor. 18:40 And to a certain extent it does mean something to have a credit 18:45 counseling agency that is accredited advocate on your 18:49 behalf as opposed to you advocating. 18:50 Because if you're late on some debt, there's really no reason 18:54 for them to believe you over... 18:55 If you're late and you hadn't paid, so what are they going 18:58 to believe you for? Right. 18:59 Now you have this credit agency. 19:01 They're saying that they have a budget put together. 19:04 They're saying that they've been talking to you, 19:06 they're working with you. 19:08 And that gives a lot more weight for them, the credit agent, 19:11 for the debtor to say, You know what, okay we'll go with 19:14 what you're saying. 19:16 They will be able to work it out. 19:17 But again, call, be forthright, and be very diligent in making 19:20 sure that whoever you owe, that you're up front with them, 19:22 you're honest with them, and you're paying back in the most 19:25 expeditious way possible. 19:27 That makes sense. Wow, these are some great steps. 19:30 Right, right. These are some great steps, and if we implement 19:33 them just like you said, a lot of... There's some places... 19:36 I did business with one where I wanted my credit score to come 19:40 up and... But I kind of noticed they were dragging their feet 19:43 like it's a certain amount each month, and then well they did 19:47 this, but they don't do that till next month. 19:51 And they're just dragging it on, whereas you could 19:53 just do it yourself. 19:55 Right, right. And so those are steps. 19:57 Now let's just, we can transition into identity theft. 20:00 I think this is a huge thing. Yes! 20:03 And many individuals, I mean we have to be cautious on how 20:07 we're using our personal information. 20:09 By all means please do not pull up any important 20:13 banking information. 20:15 I can't tell you how many individuals that I know 20:17 personally got their... because they went to a Starbucks, 20:21 or some sort of a unsecure Internet line, and then they 20:24 logged in their bank account. 20:26 I mean that's a cardinal rule. 20:28 You just don't do that. 20:29 They logged in their bank account from an unsecure 20:32 Internet, and there are people out there who making a living 20:36 fishing information off of unsecure Internet sites. 20:40 The know where every single site is. 20:42 They know they can monitor when people log on. 20:45 They have data and they have technology that allows 20:49 individuals to look and see what people are watching. 20:52 So all this... so much technology... there's data, 20:56 information out there, there's something you can even purchase 20:59 on eBay where you're walking by, and you have a credit card 21:03 in your pocket, they can take a magnet of some sort 21:06 go by you and pull your magnetic data off your credit card, 21:10 and therefore stealing your credit card information just by 21:13 walking in the same vicinity of you. Wow! 21:15 So, I mean this is... they've gotten very technical 21:18 with all this stuff here. 21:20 And so we've got to be very cautious. 21:22 Odds are that we will be a victim of identity theft. 21:26 I mean you can try as much as possible to stop it, 21:29 but the, and I'll tell you this much, the individuals who 21:34 are making millions of dollars a year by stealing information 21:38 and their investment, and making sure they can continue 21:44 to make millions of dollars by stealing information, 21:46 is not as much as the investment that we're putting in to making 21:52 sure that we can stop it. 21:53 So our law enforcement, our FBI, which is... We just don't have 21:58 the manpower to keep up with the amount of the technology 22:02 that they're doing. 22:04 So every single morning when you wake up, 22:06 I check my bank account online. 22:07 Every single... We have to do that. 22:09 I'll say that again. 22:11 Please every single morning check your bank account. 22:13 It takes five seconds. Right. 22:15 You go online, you have a general idea what the balance 22:19 was for the previous day, and how much you spent. 22:22 You check your account. 22:23 You see if there's any fraudulent activity. 22:25 And now also looking for a small activity. 22:28 Sometimes they've gotten very good at stealing in small 22:32 increments that you'll never see:.7,.17, point... 22:38 So 17 cents doesn't seem like a lot, but if they're stealing 22:42 17 cents from 100,000 people, that's a lot of money. 22:46 And they're doing that over time. 22:48 And they do it and the next thing you know it like, 22:49 where this?... And that actually happened to me before 22:52 where I said, what is this 17 cents? 22:54 And I looked it up, and I made a call, and immediately I was 22:58 talking to TV Bank and they said, You know what, 23:00 we're shutting you down. 23:01 We're shutting your credit card down. 23:02 You've got to order a new one, because that 23:04 card's been compromised. 23:05 So I said, Wow, that is a very brilliant scheme. 23:09 Because I would have never had, unless I was looking for it, 23:11 I'd have never known to look for it. Right. 23:14 So these little tricks: checking your account every single day, 23:17 making sure you're looking for any small incremental 23:21 amount that are off. 23:22 And they've gotten good to even changing 23:24 the amount of increments. 23:26 So they go from 32 cents to 15 cents, to 7 cents. 23:29 And most people are not looking at that. Right. 23:32 And they don't notice that it's missing. 23:34 So here are quick some steps, easy steps that we can use 23:39 to make sure we can avoid identity theft, 23:42 in addition to the ones I just mentioned, right? 23:44 So the first thing we have to do if we think that we're a victim 23:48 of identity theft is contact all three credit bureaus and ask 23:52 that an extended fraud alert be immediately 23:56 placed on your account. Okay? 23:58 So, again, I'll say that; extended fraud alert be 24:02 immediately placed on your account, okay? 24:04 Secondly, we want to close all accounts that have been 24:08 fraudulently accessed. 24:10 And then thirdly, we want to file a criminal complaint with 24:14 the local police department. 24:15 That's key because many banks that you want to go to and say 24:19 that my card has been compromised. 24:21 They're going to ask you for that criminal report, 24:24 because that's actually a scamming of itself to say, 24:27 you know, my card's been compromised. 24:29 They stole... I'm going to go to the store and I'm going to 24:32 spend $500, or $2,000, then go to the bank and say, 24:35 I didn't spend it. Right. 24:37 You know, so that criminal report adds a little 24:39 bit of validity to it. 24:41 And then 4th, report the theft at the ID Theft Clearing House 24:46 at 877-IDTHEFT. 24:49 And so these four steps will, again, just help individuals 24:53 to make sure that at the end of the day they're doing what's 24:57 necessary to make sure that they are not being an identity 25:01 theft victim all over again. 25:02 What do you think about those companies that offer you 25:07 identity theft protection? Yes. 25:09 There's one particular one I'm thinking of. 25:11 I won't name it, but they say, you know, we'll protect you 25:14 against identity theft, all that. 25:15 What do you think about those? 25:17 Well, they actually do a service. 25:19 They do a service, and again that service is something that 25:22 you could probably do yourself for free, 25:24 but will you do it yourself for free? 25:26 So just like any other service, we just need to make sure that 25:30 we know what we're spending our money on. 25:32 And I can probably guess the name of the company 25:36 you're talking about, but that one particular company 25:38 does a decent job of monitoring. 25:41 So if you're that type that you just know, Hey, you know what? 25:45 I'm not going to be the one monitoring that 25:48 on a regular basis. 25:49 Then I think it might be $15 or $17 a month, or whatever it is. 25:53 That $17 a month could be worth it for you. 25:56 It's a service of something that you wouldn't do yourself, 25:58 that gets you an extra added layer of protection, 26:00 that makes sure that they're monitoring any additional 26:03 expenditures that you hadn't necessarily, didn't have done. 26:07 So again, anytime we spend money we should be questioning, 26:11 do I need to do this? 26:13 Can I do this myself? 26:15 Is there a way I can do this less expensively? 26:18 But also I don't want to compromise the integrity of 26:20 something that can actually be adding me value. 26:22 Because, for instance, I want to have a segment of stocks 26:27 on how to select a financial adviser. 26:29 I do believe that we should get financial advisers. 26:32 And sometimes we have to pay for them, either, or depending 26:37 upon the type that we get. 26:38 We'll be talking about this. 26:40 I prefer a registered investment adviser that has a fee only, 26:43 that doesn't have a conflict of interest trying to sell you 26:46 investments based on commission. 26:48 So we'll definitely be talking about that. 26:51 But even with that, questioning, can I do this myself? 26:54 And do I want to? And do I have the ability to do it? 26:58 Am I playing myself cheap? 27:00 Because you don't want to do that. 27:01 And that's going to compromise the integrity of actually moving 27:04 yourself forward economically. 27:05 So for identity theft services it could be very good. 27:09 I've seen a lot of people say, You know what, they work for me. 27:13 It gives me a protection. 27:15 It keeps me sane at night. 27:17 And I check my account every morning. 27:20 Someone said to me the other day, Ryan, I check my account 27:23 every single day, but I need to have that service just to make 27:25 me, just keep me sane. 27:27 And I say, you know what, if that keeps you sane 27:28 that's, that works for me. 27:30 Cause there's minimal; the cost is minimal. Exactly. 27:32 And like you said, you have to evaluate it for yourself. 27:35 Exactly. Well you have given us, once again, 27:38 some rich information. 27:40 And I know you're going to give us a dynamite take away. 27:42 Absolutely! Let's go! 27:47 Every successful financial plan needs to have clean credit, 27:50 and a high Fico score. 27:52 If we are to see more home and business ownership, 27:55 having good credit is the first step towards 27:57 accomplishing this goal. 27:58 Too many times I've personally seen many opportunities missed 28:01 because we have not taken the time to clean our credit. 28:04 The word says in Proverbs 10:9, Whoever walks in integrity 28:07 walks securely, but he who makes his way 28:10 crooked will be found out. 28:11 A higher credit score shows the integrity we must possess 28:14 to turn our communities around. 28:16 As always, be the change, and remember, the purpose of life 28:19 is a life of purpose. Be blessed. |
Revised 2021-05-11