7. The FAMILY Method™: How Modern Families Build Wealth, Protection, and Legacy (Part 1 - F)
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~Hey friends, it is Calista Anderson.~ [00:00:00]
Hey friends, it's Calista Anderson. Welcome back to the household CEO Podcast. So glad to have you back, and if you've been following along the first several episodes of this podcast and have gotten value out of them, ~please hit the follow button. ~Please hit the follow button and leave a rating. It would be so great to help spread this show to reach more people.
All right, so we are in episode seven now, and this is actually gonna kick off a series that gets more into the financial side of the household. Over the past few episodes, we've talked about calendars, decision systems, protecting your time, ~and running your whole. ~And running your household like a CEO. I would say that those things are more of the operation side of the household, but today we're gonna step into the financial side of the household because a household, CEO.
Doesn't just [00:01:00] manage schedules, she manages the economy of her home. So today I'm introducing something I've built specifically for modern families who want peace, stability, and legacy without being financial experts. It's called the Family Method, and Family is actually an acronym, ~F-A-M-I-L-Y.~
F-A-M-I-L-Y ~method~
~and ~using this method is how families move from financial stress to financial security one step at a time ~before even the first step of anything is taken. ~Just like in anything else before even the first step is taken. We need a good foundation. A foundation that makes us feel confident
confident that we know what we can do, ~and we have a p. ~And we have a blueprint to follow. When I say feel confident, it doesn't actually mean you have it all already, but it's that feeling of you have a plan you believe in and [00:02:00] you're serious about following it. ~Sports teams have, ~sports teams have playbooks.
Builders have blueprints. ~IKEA furniture have. ~IKEA furniture has very simple instruction manuals. So what is your playbook or blueprint or manual for your own household finances? This Family method series is going to offer a step-by-step guide to help you if you don't already have one in place. So I'm really excited to get into part one of the Family Method.
So let's get into it.
All right guys. Would you agree that many families, you know, feel stressed about money? Maybe you feel stressed about money in your household? So let's talk about what's actually happening in the economy right now. Not the headlines, but the reality. . Most [00:03:00] American families live and feel recent data shows that roughly two thirds of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck, meaning most people don't have a buffer when prices go up or emergencies hit.
Housing costs have jumped significantly faster than incomes, and many families spend more than 30% of their take home pay on rent or mortgages alone. Everyday essentials like food, utilities, and healthcare have risen persistently squeezing budgets even when the wages move up slightly.
Many households have little leftover to save, invest, or build security, making financial stress the new normal for millions. This is what people mean when they talk about an affordability crisis. The dollar isn't worth what it used to be, and costs are outpacing wage growth. And here's the hard truth. No government program or headline [00:04:00] solution is going to manage your cash flow for you.
Real financial resilience comes from your decisions, how you track your money control costs, build income streams, and protect your family because unfortunately, ~no one else is coming to save you.~
~Because ~no one else is coming to save you. I would say that most families, as in the majority of American families who feel financial stress are not. Irresponsible. Of course there are people who are very irresponsible with money. You know, people who live a very consumeristic or materialistic lifestyle.
Shopaholics gamblers, but that's not who I'm talking about, and that's not most people,
I believe most people who are stressed about money are affected ~by the current. ~By the current economic conditions of today for sure. And secondly, they didn't get the financial literacy and education that we all should have been taught in school. I [00:05:00] know I was never taught how to rent a household with all the finances that come along with it, how to grow our money and ultimately have a legacy to leave my children and future generations, but even just the generation I am raising in our current household, ~the household.~
I mean, that is a great place to start. The household is truly an entity that needs money to operate just like a business does. ~We have a, we. ~Unfortunately, we have very little influence in the grand scheme of things in the economic conditions of our country, but we have great influence and in fact, great responsibility to influence and manage our own household from the inside here and out to the outside in future, which is why I am so excited to do this series with my family method.
Most households don't have a financial system that is guiding them in the big picture of money.
Money comes in, money goes out, [00:06:00] bills get paid, credit cards get used, and at the end of the month people hope there's something left, but no one ever taught them how to look at the whole picture. We're taught.
We're taught fragments, save more, spend, less invest, and don't have debt. But no one teaches us the order or the structure. So.
~So ~people do things like invest before they have cash flow or save before they stabilize their bills. ~They try to grow wealth, ~they try to grow wealth while their foundation is cracked, and that creates anxiety. That's why so many high income families still feel like they're barely holding it together
and they don't need more hustle. They need a better map. ~So I wanna tell you, ~so I wanna tell you guys about the family method. Family is F-A-M-I-L-Y, and I'll quickly go over what each of those letters stand for or
This is the order that stable [00:07:00] wealthy families follow, and guess what? They taught their children. That's why there's such a term called old money. Doing this over a long period of time makes their money old. Now, I am not from old money, but I definitely would like to help start and create that for my kids and their kids.
I come from a working background, and as you may know, ~I, ~my background is in nursing. I worked as a registered nurse in the ICU for many years, and then I got into the financial industry as a licensed financial professional.
~So my background is in nursing. I worked as a registered nurse in the ICU for many years. Then ~I became a new mom coach, and actually my previous podcast still exists. It's called The New Mom Boss Podcast that helps pregnant and postpartum moms. And I put that show down a few years ago because I wanted to work on my financial future for my own family.
And that's when I got into the financial industry [00:08:00] as a licensed financial professional. At first, it was just to learn for myself. I'm a big junkie when it comes to learning. . I love taking all kinds of courses. ~I, ~I've taken yoga certification courses. ~Um. ~Breastfeeding courses, like everything I wanted to know for myself and some of these things, I ended up, sharing with other people in forms of coaching programs and like I said, the new Mom Boss podcast and now I'm on this financial freedom journey and chapter in my life, ~which is why I, which is ~which I am infusing into this podcast. So not only do I want to share how to run a household like a CEO, ~but the. ~Which includes the operations of a household, but also the financial side of the household.
Anyhow, ~back, so ~in this series, we'll be diving into each letter of the Family Method over the next several episodes, and today we begin with the [00:09:00] foundation.
So family, let me back up. Family stands for the following. F is to fund and manage your cash flow. A is to attack debt. M is to ~multiply income. M is ~multiply income. I is ensure. What matters, L is to leverage your assets and Y is your legacy.
This is the order that stable wealthy families follow.
You guys ready? All right, so the first letter of the family method is F, which stands for fund and manage your cash flow.
Sounds pretty simple and it is, but be honest. How much are you actually paying attention to your cash flow? Cashflow is not about how much you make. It's [00:10:00] about how much is left over after everything goes out. You can have a six figure income ~and steal ~and still feel broke. You can have a modest income and feel secure.
The difference is cash flow. It's the oxygen of your home. ~'cause it is a 'cause. ~It's what allows you to save, invest, travel, handle emergencies, and sleep well at night. Without it, everything feels fragile. And this is where the household CEO in you steps in.
So the F is for funding cash flow, which means making sure there's enough money coming in to support your household.
That could include negotiating your pay, adding aside income, changing jobs, starting a business, and eventually possibly investing.
~And funding your cash flow actually ties into.~
~So funding the cash flow. ~So funding cash flow actually ties in with ~the let ~the step M ~of multiply your income. ~Of [00:11:00] multiply income,
but there's another side of letter F, which is not only do you have to fund your cash flow, but you have to manage it as well.
~This is, ~this is where most families avoid looking, but this is where the power lives. Managing your cash flow means knowing what comes in, knowing what goes out, and knowing where it goes.
~And staying. Oh.~
And staying within a budget that makes sense for you and your family. This is why I use Monarch Money. Monarch Money is a subscription based all in one personal finance app that helps users track spending, create budgets, monitor your investments, and manage your net worth by connecting all your financial accounts in one place.
So how it works is. All your transactions because you connect all your accounts to it, ~you label, ~you get to label those transactions and they're [00:12:00] put in buckets.
~And there ~there are other apps and subscription. Platforms that can track your finance. I just happen to really love Monarch money. It's super simple to use and you can check it out.
I'll ~put a link, you can check it out. I'll put a link in the show notes and you'll get 50% off your first year if you wanna sign up.~
~I will ~put a link in the show notes. If you use my link, you'll get 50% off your first year.
Now how I use this is I label each transaction, there's a lot of heavy lifting in the beginning, labeling all your transactions. If it's a recurring transaction, you can label things simultaneously, like click on a bunch of things and label it at once.
Okay. And after a while, ~it knows that ~it gets to know your transactions and it labels it for you. You could always review it and check it to make sure it's accurate. Now, how I use it is at least once a week, I open it up and I label or just look at the transactions, make sure they're all labeled [00:13:00] correctly.
And I really love the little icons you can pick for each category. I think it looks really fun. It makes it not so boring. And I also don't have to go through each of my accounts. You know, ~it's, ~I just go into this app and I can see it, whether it's on the desktop or on my phone.
When you start labeling your spending. ~Appearing. ~You Start to see how much you actually spend on food, for instance, or what subscriptions you forgot about. . You can actually get to see what kind of lifestyle you have, where you're spending the most money, and what categories might be outta control.
~Um.~
So it really gives you a lot of awareness ~about where, ~about your spending habits.
It has the good, the bad, and the ugly, which is the first step to make any changes, it really gives you awareness
now. I [00:14:00] believe ~now I think ~every household has its leaks, whether it's subscriptions, auto renewals, you forgot ~using convenience spend, using convene, ~using convenience shopping more than is necessary, possibly paying interest. When you cancel just a few things, ~you can often find hundreds of dollars.~
You can often find a few hundred dollars a month and that money can become part of your emergency fund, help pay off debt or start ~investing or ~putting it towards investments.
This is why I teach families ~to make their monthly, ~to make their monthly nut as lean as possible.
Monthly nut is just another term for your monthly expenses. ~Now, how can you keep it lean when you don't follow. How can you, it, ~it's hard to keep your monthly nut lean when you don't know what's happening.
So that is basically what the F in the family method is your first step, ~and if you wanna get, ~and if you wanna start to get more control of your household finances.
I encourage you to take this [00:15:00] step this week. Look at your accounts or sign up for the Monarch money if you think it's a good fit for you, and just ask yourself, are we cash flow positive or negative? In fact, if you use Monarch money, it'll illustrate it for you visually.
And that's another reason I like it. I don't have to do a bunch of calculations. It just adds and subtracts all the ins and outs of all our transactions. But if you prefer to just look at all your accounts and do it manually, that's fine too. But I want you to find three leaks to plug.
One thing about doing it manually though, ~I want, ~I have to say you don't really see, ~uh, ~one picture 'cause you have to go from one account to another. It's really hard for our brains to put all that together into one visualization, but you can totally still do it
Now once [00:16:00] you take a look at all your accounts you're gonna see a pattern, and I want you to find three leaks to plug. It might be canceling a subscription you don't use anymore, or changing a certain subscription plan from a premium plan to a basic plan because you don't really need all the extra things.
~Or maybe you see you've been going to Starbucks. A lot. Uh, maybe just going one less time per week, whatever you want it.~
Or it could be seeing a pattern of lots of Starbucks runs and maybe just decreasing that by one less time per week. Whatever you want. It's your pick.
~But. ~But if that's too much too soon, that's okay. I know it took me a while to really ~s ~look at my pattern and see ~where I wanted to, ~which plugs I wanted to take care of, and that's okay. The biggest thing is your awareness of where your cash flow is and where your potential leaks are.
~I know in my experience when there is the new awareness on something, I know that I, ~I know in my experience ~when there,~
~when I become, ~when I come to a new awareness on something that I know I wanna change , but [00:17:00] am not ready to change. I cannot unknow it, and it will be there in the back of my mind and eventually I'll just wanna take care of it because truly, although it may seem hard to take action, in action, actually burns ~more mental clarity, ~more mental calories.
And going back to the last episode where I talked about winter and how it's not a big action taking month in nature and for us naturally, this might be a good time to just do something like this ~and track your tra and track your. ~And track your accounts and spending without even taking action.
~Awareness is a good action to~
~having. ~having. Awareness is just a great place to start. You don't need perfection. You need visibility.
And that's it. That is ~F. ~F. Funding and managing your cash flow.
So that you will hopefully be in the green and have the [00:18:00] extra money every month ~to put towards~
~your current. ~To put towards things like emergency funds or a trip you wanna take,
~invest, ~setting aside investments ~and, ~and ~retirement accounts and ~retirement accounts.
In the next episode, we'll move to letter A of the family method, which is to ~attack debt, which is ~attack debt. Not with shame, but with strategy because debt is not a moral failure. It's a math problem.
You don't need to have it all figured out. You just need to start with the right framework. Welcome to the Family Method. Your household just became your financial headquarters. Again, if you haven't ~hit the follow button, go ahead and do that so you don't miss anything. And until next time, take care.~
~Friends, again, if you haven't hit. Again, if you haven't yet, ~hit the follow button. Go ahead and do that so you don't miss anything. And until next time, friends, take care. [00:19:00]
