Scott: Today, we’re going to hear from somebody who beat the odds. Mark grew up in a foster care system and experienced every odd, all the odds that you can have stacked against you in his upbringing. He beat that through a combination of hustle, frugality, and getting in the room with rich people who knew what they were talking about and could share tips and tricks to get ahead.
Amanda: Exactly. I’m so excited to talk to Mark today, Scott. So, Mark is one of my dear friends who I met online and has a turned to in-real-life friend, and his name is Mark Russell from the Better Wallet. So, in talking to him today, we’re going to be able to hear directly from him the exact steps that he took once he became responsible for his own finances. And he’s going to talk about the money rules that he himself follows and that allowed him to get to where he is today in life.
Scott: Hello, hello, hello, and welcome to the BiggerPockets Money Podcast. I’ms Scott Trench, and with me today is the She-Wolf of Wall Street, Amanda Wolf.
Amanda: Hello, Scott. I’m so excited to be here. I feel like I’ve been, uh, stepping in and hosting more shows with you a lot lately and it’s really exciting for me. So it’s really, really good to be back.
Scott: It’s awesome.
Amanda: All right, we’re here to make financial independence less scary and less just for somebody else. To introduce you to every money story, because we truly believe financial freedom is attainable for everyone, no matter where or when you’re starting.
Scott: And one thing I want to call out about today’s episode before we bring in Mark is I thought there was a lot of parallels to your story, Amanda, and with money and your upbringing and the odds that you overcame to get to where you are today. Um, which by the way, if anybody wants to check it out, you can listen to that episode of the BiggerPockets Money Podcast where we interviewed Amanda on her story, um, on the 329th episode. So, biggerpockets.com/moneyshow329.
Amanda: Yeah, I can tell you that, um, Mark and I actually really initially bonded over, uh, growing up in poverty and while we don’t have the same story by any means, and you’ll get to hear all about his today, you can feel really alone when you have an upbringing like this. I know that there are millions of people out there with very similar stories, but it, you know, you can kind of feel like you are just on this isolated island. So it certainly was a bonding, uh, subject for both of us and, you know, hopefully somebody else who’s who is out there listening today who maybe has a similar story will just know that they’re not alone, that you can beat the odds and that you can, um, live a life of wealth and, um, really move past that survival mode. So.
Scott: Absolutely. And hopefully, you know, some folks between, you know, the both of these two wonderful stories, you might be able to find some patterns and behaviors that, uh, Amanda and Mark pursued that I think are are really really increased their odds of success, such as getting in the room with the right people, um, whatever it took. All right, let’s go talk to Mark.
Scott: Mark, welcome to the BiggerPockets Money Podcast.
Mark: Thank you. Thank you for having me on. I’m pretty excited.
Scott: Yeah. Well, today you’re helping hundreds of thousands of people build generational wealth. I’d love to start at the beginning of your story and have you paint us a picture of what your childhood looked like and what your upbringing was around money.
Mark: Yeah, definitely. And I think Amanda has probably heard it like a million and twelve times at this point. Um, but just for for context. So I was born in Philadelphia, um, born to two parents that were victims of of drug abuse. So immediately I was placed in the foster care after, um, after the NICU. And, uh, I spent about 13 years of my of my childhood in, uh, in foster care kind of bouncing around from home to home. Live with all types of different people. It gave me a strong appreciation for for different cultures. Um, lived with the Amish people for, um, a little bit of time, which was cool. So I lived on a farm, like all those things, uh, throughout the age of what, zero to to 13.
Mark: And then finally, I found myself at a, at a house where, um, you know, a very loving family, prioritized education, and, uh, they eventually adopted me at at 13. It was my first time having a a formal mom and and a dad, uh, which for a kid that just had dreams in his head of like traveling and and doing things and doing well academically, um, they they definitely instilled a lot of that in me. Um, my dad was a a sailor. He was, uh, in the navy and my mom was a high security prison guard so we came, uh, or I came into a fairly disciplined household.
Amanda: Wait, so I want to take it back like a quick a quick second because the moving around, like, I’ve heard your story before, but I never get tired of hearing it and hearing about like the different types of families you lived with is is crazy to me. So when you were moving from home to home and before you actually got adopted, were you noticing how the different families that you were living with were dealing with money, spending money, talking about money? Do you have any type of memory of that?
Mark: Not, not really. I mean, it, when you’re a kid, you’re not as focused on money flow and who’s paying the bills or what have you. I would say some families definitely spent more money than others. When I lived with the Amish, they spent almost nothing because they just lived off the land and, um, you know, we drove around like buggies and things like that. So I like I kind of remember those. Um, but no, I I don’t really have as many memories. It wasn’t until I joined the family that, um, you know, I eventually got adopted where they would talk more about money because the area where I grew up is known as being one of the poorest small towns in the entire country. You know, most of the people who were around me, a lot of my friends all grew up below the poverty line. So it was a normal conversation to say, hey, like we can’t we can’t pay for bills, we can’t pay for uh gas and oil and all these things. So I would sometimes have to work and cut grass in order to give the money to my parents so they can keep the heat on throughout the winter. Um, that was a very normal, um, normal thing that I had to do. But again, like it wasn’t until I got older where I realized that that isn’t what kids should be doing. Uh, kids should be playing around and not necessarily working at the age of 13, 14. Um, but that’s what we had to do and to make sure the lights were were still on.
Scott: So can you give by think we should go a little level deeper here and understand. So you’re helping out and pitching in for household expenses by working at the age of 13 or 14. What was the overall mentality around money, uh, uh in this family? Was it a, uh, was there savings? Was there a lot of, was there spending every dollar that came in? What was the…
Mark: It was basically survive and advance, right? So like how can we accumulate enough money in order to pay for food and uh, the the bills and the mortgage in order for us to not, or in order for us to move to the to the next month. So that was, that was basically the mentality. There was no, I I think the extent of my financial knowledge or financial education growing up was, hey, make money and try to put whatever you can in the bank. Any money that’s left over from giving us money or you buying whatever I was buying as a kid, like I would buy like, you know, I remember buying my first pair of shoes. Um, you know, they would say, hey, like, you know, make sure that money is going to the bank, make sure that you’re, you know, focusing on the habit of putting even five, $10 dollars away per month. Um, but that was the, that was the extent of it. Uh, we didn’t really learn about investing. Both my parents, one my mom had, uh, she worked with the state so she had some sort of like a pension, but my dad didn’t have a 401K or anything of that nature. So I didn’t learn a lot of that until much later.
Amanda: So then, as you’re growing up, was like, where did college come into this? Because you, you know, you went to Penn State. Was going to college a no-brainer for you? Were your parents pushing college? Like, where did that all come into play?
Mark: Yeah, so college was very much, um, an idea versus, you know, something that was like pushed on me. I just knew that if I wanted to escape that small town where everyone lived in poverty, I had only two options, and it was going like the Navy and and going off to college. So I thought that I could go on a college, a college campus and they’re just going to pay for it, right? Um, and that both my parents didn’t go off to college so I didn’t know any better. Um, but that was that was basically it. I wanted to escape the life that I was that I was currently in and I knew I didn’t want to go to I knew I knew I didn’t want to go to the Navy. and that was that was basically it. So me applying to schools, I just applied for schools that are around the area. Um, know I applied to University of Pittsburgh, Penn State, which was probably like an hour away. Um, and then a couple other smaller schools where I felt like I could maybe get an academic scholarship. Um, but that was basically the extent of it.
Amanda: Cuz at this point you’d been like, you know, spending every dollar you made or putting it in the bank or giving it to other people. So then how did you pay for college? Or did that like concern you at all and taking on any type of debt? Did you get a scholarship or everything? Or how did you fund your college?
Mark: Yeah, definitely. So I stepped on the campus, um, at at Penn State and the first email I got from Penn State was, hey, welcome to Penn State. The second one was, you owe us $20,000. So I’m like, okay, well, you know, I’m, I think of all the things, right? So when you don’t know anything about college, you just assume that everything’s going to be paid for. So in my head, I’m like, okay, I was adopted, I’m left-handed, like I’m black. Like, you have to find some scholarship for me out here. There has, there has to be one and I found that there weren’t many scholarships for those, uh, criteria that are out there. at least the year that I applied. And um, I found myself on campus needing to figure it out basically. So I did what I knew I could do, and I went to the student aid office and basically begged for money every single day in the beginning of every semester. And Penn State, they’re great at a lot of different things, but one thing that they’re notoriously bad at is finding money for their their students. So you either have it or you don’t. Uh, the funny thing is, my maybe it’s funny now, but it wasn’t funny then, my uh roommate who’s like one of my best friends, he had a 529 account. So his parents were able to write one check, pay for all four years of uh of Penn State and then he was good to go, had a laptop and everything. I found myself on campus not having books, no laptop, literally nothing. Um, so and even at Penn State, they also do not allow you to know what your grades are until you fully pay off your uh your schooling or pay for that semester. So you’re basically flying blind for multiple semesters if you don’t have it paid off. So that is something I learned the the hard way. Um, but yeah, no, it’s begging the tuition, uh, the the student aid office and I think also I I was able to make a connections with the vice provost at Penn State as well as the Dean because I knew that if I was going to pay for school, then they’re going to have to jump in and and help me figure it out. Um, and luckily they were able to pull some strings to, you know, maybe pay $3,000, $4,000 here and there. But then I also had to apply for scholarships and grants, um, all of which I took away from my my academics.
Scott: All right, we’re talking to Mark from Better Wallet about his journey through the foster care system and growing up in poverty. We’re going to take a quick break, but when we’re back, Mark is going to tell us the steps he took that got him to beat the odds and find his way to financial independence.
Scott: Welcome back to BP Money everybody. What what were you doing? Were you working uh during college?
Mark: Dude, I had to sell plasma. I was an RA, a resident assistant for some time. I was a referee. I was doing whatever I possibly could to put money in my pocket and make sure I didn’t starve and then also pay off my uh my tuition. I was a barber as well. So I learned how to cut hair when I was a kid I was like one of my side hustles I would do. And uh, I had, it start off with like maybe three or four people that would come in every Saturday and get their haircut. And I wasn’t doing, I mean the haircuts now, like you have a really nice haircut, right? Like you know, maybe like a two on the side, maybe like three or four on top, right? Before like the last 10, 15 years, it would just be a buzz cut, right? Especially if you’re in college, you don’t care. So I would charge them about like $10 and I’ll cut their hair for like five minutes and then I’ll have clientele, more and more clientele coming in and that’s how I went about like, you know, affording food and you know, paying for tuition. So whenever everyone else was hanging out in the afternoons on Saturday and Sunday, I was cutting hair.
Scott: So, I can’t resist. Sounds like you operated your college years with razor thin margins here. Um, can you tell us about your situation graduating college? What what what did things look like uh after graduation? how much did you have your name and what were you doing next?
Mark: Yeah, no, definitely. So after, I should I should mention after freshman year, uh I was actually kicked out of Penn State uh because I couldn’t pay $900 on my tuition bill. Um, which I look back at it now and I’m like $900, I got kicked out for $900. Um, that same summer, maybe even, I want to say it was probably like three months later I end up losing my adopted dad, literally right before my eyes. So you kind of combine all that together and your life changes overnight. I was definitely, I would say like a little bit more immature my freshman year, but as soon as sophomore year popped up and you know, I had to you go from a boy to a man overnight, all that a lot of that stuff changed, right? I went on just overdrive trying to figure out how I could pay for school, how can I graduate within the next uh three years.
Mark: And one of the things I would do because my my dad was really passionate about giving back, um, giving back in the form of like cooking for people or he would often bring people into the house that were like homeless or maybe they served time in jail, whatever it might be and they didn’t have a house to to live in. Um, so giving back was a big part of what I did when I was at Penn State because it was my way of uh living on my my dad’s legacy. So what I did was I would help kids afford school the way I went about affording school. Um, and I remember building like different guides on like how can you go about um applying for scholarships, how can you apply for grants? I taught them how to negotiate um with the people in the student aid office in order to get bigger scholarships. So a lot of that, um, I I loved doing and you combine that with the fact that I was a resident assistant as well. Um, and then you know, Penn State being a a pretty good business school. I applied to every financial firm that I possibly could um at that time. And the company that I heard back from the quickest was the Vanguard Group, which at the time I had no clue who they were. I remember having the conversation with my mom and I was like, hey mom, I got into this place called Vanguard. Well, I got an interview from them. And she’s like, oh, like Vanguard. and I was like, oh, like they something about securities and she was like, oh, like a security system like ADT. And I’m like, no, not ADT, mom, like, like Wall Street stuff. And she’s like, oh, I don’t think you should take that offer. I think that’s a little bit too much. And I’m like, okay, we’ll see. So I end up interviewing and getting in and um they love the combination of everything that I went through, um, and the the giving back that I did when I was at Penn State. You combine that with understanding a little bit about uh investments and finance and then also I had an economics and business economics degree. You combine all that together and that was exactly what they were looking for for one of the, um, they they had this management leadership development program at Vanguard where they only choose maybe 20 people out of the country. And, uh, luckily I was able to get into that program, um, which completely changed my life.
Amanda: That is insane. When you were teaching your friends about money and you were like giving back with, you know, the financial empowerment, how did you teach yourself all of that stuff? Like, how did you figure out what grants and scholarships to apply for? How did you figure out how to budget your money and how to create side hustles for yourself? Like, how did you do all of that?
Mark: Yeah, I mean, that really came down to, I mean, I I had really great mentors when I was at Penn State. Um, people that I’d met when I was in high school or people that uh went from my high school that uh you know, worked at Penn State because Penn State was basically like one of the bigger employers in my area. So, I ended up connecting with them, um, and asking them, hey, like, how do you go about budgeting your money? So at a very young age, I’ve just always been curious about how older people did certain things as it related to to money. Um, and then also the the internet’s great as well, trying to find new scholarships, uh trying to find the different grants, talking to the student aid office and asking them like what I can do that other people are not doing and that allowed me to um really get a leg up on on getting a lot of those grants and scholarships that a lot of people wouldn’t apply for.
Mark: And then I would say I also learned a lot about how the school worked and interest rates and uh loans and how they work when I got kicked out of school. When I got kicked out, that is the perfect way of figuring out everything about finance and everything about applying for school because you see the inner workings of how everything happens. Um, so when you go through what they call retroactive registration, which basically means you get kicked out and then you have to find ways to pay for school that are out of pocket because they take away your student loans and they take away your any student aid, you learn all about personal loans because we had to try to take out a personal loan. You learn all about interest rates, which this was 2009, so interest rates were like through the roof. Um, there’s a lot of different factors and a lot of different terms and skills that you learn in a short period of time when you’re trying to get back into school and you don’t have the money to uh to pay for it.
Scott: Well, I’d love to move to this next leg of the journey. It sounds like we have those three parts of the journey here to discuss today, and I’d love to move to what I’m going to call part two here. You you might call it something else. but like this this this phase of like we get we get the job at Vanguard and sounds like life, what what happens after college? How does your money story continue and how do you go on to begin accumulating personal wealth?
Mark: Yeah, definitely. So as I started my first job at Vanguard, my first job was basically, if you call Vanguard or Fidelity right now, and you want to talk about your 401k, you probably would have called someone like me where I would help you kind of navigate what you should be investing in, if you want to take a loan or withdrawal of your 401k, I would hand I’ll handle those transactions. So, though I was giving, you know, financial advice or financial guidance during that time, because I was a a stock broker, um, I found myself in debt up to my eyeballs. So I had my, uh, student loan debt, I had credit card debt that I accumulated from college because I, you know, needed to. Um, and then I also had a, you know, used car that I just bought, right? So I have that loan as well. and I found myself thinking, well, I’m making $55,000 a year and I worked really hard to get here, but I’m living paycheck to paycheck, very similar to everyone that I grew up with. Did college actually help me or did it hurt me? And at that point, I said, okay, well, I need to understand how to go about budgeting my money the right way. I need to understand where my money is going, and I need to figure out how the heck I can get out of this debt.
Mark: So, as a very curious kid, as people would call in, as I mentioned, a lot of them were multi-millionaires from, you know, their 401ks or whatever it might be, I would ask them, hey, like, how did you accumulate this wealth? How did you pay off your debt? How do you budget your money? And that was like very inspiring for me. Like it it led me to say, okay, well, there’s a formula to making this money. And they would say, okay, well, I was a business owner, like I did all these things. And then I would just focus on habits. I would focus on habits of putting money away every single month, every year, whatever it might be, and then also building businesses in order to fund, you know, my my investments.
Amanda: Can I ask how much debt did you have? Because you keep saying I had debt up my eyeballs. so like how much are we talking?
Mark: Yeah, so $80,000 of debt, so 50,000 that came from um student loan debt and then 20,000 for my car and then 10,000 for uh high interest credit card debt.
Amanda: Oh my gosh. So that is a lot. And then I was also shocked when you just said that you made 55,000 at Vanguard. I guess you would you would think like a big financial institution would be like paying top dollars. So then having all that debt with that salary too, I’m sure like just to your point, added to it. You’re like, oh my gosh, I got educated, like, where’s my money? why don’t I still why don’t I still have any?
Scott: So I’m, I’m, I’m uh on your LinkedIn here just looking at this to get the timelines here. So you started at Vanguard in 2012 and you finished in 2017. What, how, what, what uh progress, how would you kind of at the highest level, the progress you made in your personal finances over that five, six-year period?
Mark: Yeah, so 2012 came in, I was basically just a kid from the hood that didn’t know anything about finance, um, beyond like, you know, regular, how do you budget and all the things you would learn while you’re in college as you know, I mentioned about scholarships and grants, uh, and personal loans. So you start off with that and then, you know, I was around a bunch of basically trust fund kids, a lot of people that were within the program, both all their parents were either hedge fund managers or big managers at different firms. So you learn a lot about your overall debt, right? So understanding, okay, like what are the interest rates, why does it matter? What are my minimal payments? What happens if I make more than the minimal payment? Um, and then that transitions to just understanding how investing works in general.
Mark: Um, a lot of the eye opening moments for me were talking to people on the phone and them saying, well, um, you know, I need you to help me out with this issue and then I fixed the issue and then a few months later they’d call in. I’d look at the same account and I realized they appreciated by $20,000 passively. Like that was mind-blowing to me. Like my dad who was, you know, he’s in the Navy but he worked a job where he moved boxes from one conveyor belt to another. He made $40,000 a year. So the fact that they were able to make $20,000 passively, half of what he made in this crazy job that he worked, blew my mind. I didn’t know that even existed. So, uh, that that was, that was like a big moment for me. And then as I’m starting to figure out my own 401k and how it worked, right? Investing for your 401k, uh, investing in my brokerage account and then also paying off my debt, it just becomes more and more complex as you go. So from 2012, literally knowing nothing about personal finance, or at least the more complex strategies, to leaving Vanguard and understanding everything in between, you know, even understanding how to invest for your kids. You know, the 529 department was great because I was talking to grandparents and parents and even extremely rich people that would hide money in 529 accounts because it’s not, you know, uh, including your taxable estate. That’s something we can talk about later. But, you know, you kind of learn about all that and you start asking questions and you understand how it applies to you. So by the time I left Vanguard, I already had a 529 set up and know I didn’t even have a kid because I knew of different tax strategies that I could take advantage of, um, with the 529 that a lot of people did not know.
Amanda: How about your debt? How much uh of that did you chunk down over this five year, five or six year period as well?
Mark: Yeah, so from 2012 to maybe 2017, I would say that I have it somewhere, but I want to say I probably, by the time 2018 came up, I paid off my car and I only have my credit card debt left, and also my student loan debt. So I probably had like 30,000 left from 2018 to 2020.
Scott: Okay, so you made a choice then it sounds like to invest rather than pay off the debt. Can you walk us through that philosophy and how that guided your decision making and what you what you uh chose to put your money into instead of paying down the debt?
Mark: Yeah, definitely. So one thing I did not want is, you know, to become debt free and you know, my goal was to be debt free by 2020, not knowing the pandemic was going to happen. Um, but debt free by 2020 and also have a retirement account. And um, as I mentioned that, you know, at Vanguard, they were great with benefits. So one thing that Vanguard offered was 10% of your salary would go towards your, um, go towards your 401k every quarter, which again, like I didn’t know what that meant when I was at, you know, Vanguard. But then afterwards when I realized that benefit, I was like, oh my god, this is amazing, right? So that was the basically the extent of me investing was making sure I had enough money in my 401k. Um, you know, Vanguard also had the match, right? So I’m putting that money away because I want to make sure when I was debt free, I also had an investing account. But yeah, why I’m going to make sure I had a balance between paying off debt and then also investing uh with my retirement. So I had enough or I had at least the the money that I put away for retirement by the time that I uh became debt-free.
Scott: Stay with us. When we’re back from a quick break, Mark will reveal to us his three money rules that guide his financial decision making.
Scott: Welcome back to the BiggerPockets Money Podcast. Okay, and then I I have a question. Okay, because you were balancing the debt payoff and the investing, you were talking to a lot of rich people. I feel like maybe some of us don’t have a lot of rich people that we can just ask these types of questions to. So, what would you say was like the common theme when you worked in these different departments, you’re talking to wealthy people, whether they’re parents, grandparents, um, what have you? What would you say are like three common themes that they would say of how they built their wealth or um how they basically got to the point that they were at that time?
Mark: Yeah, so I think there’s a lot of different avenues that you can go, um, uh, with those three routes. So, number one was knowing where your money was going. That was number one. I think a lot of people we spend money and I think we hope to know where our money is going throughout the the month, but a lot of us don’t even know how much we spent over the last 24 hours. So number one, understand where your money is going. I I think was number one. Uh, number two is definitely paying down your debt, especially your a consumer debt. Um, you know, I I understand mortgages and like, uh, leverage if you will, but you know, paying down that consumer debt, paying down your credit cards, paying down, um, any personal loans that you might have, uh, could basically increase your your overall discretionary income. And then number three, most all of the people that I’ve talked to, they will all always say have a side hustle, have a different business on the side, whatever it might be, that way you can increase your discretionary income and then you can invest.
Mark: That’s basically the the formula that I think so many people make so difficult. Um, you know, knowing where your money is going, paying down your, uh, expensive debt, I should, I should say, and then also, uh, increasing your overall income. Uh, that was the overall strategy. How you go about doing all three of those, it really depends on who you are and and, um, you know, what makes you what makes you happy. I mean, we’re all creators online, but for some people, it might be, I was just talking to my barber not too long ago and he’s trying to build his own barber shop. Um, and he doesn’t like anything about being online or being a creator. So, uh, whatever that might look like for you, I I say go after it, but those are the common themes.
Scott: So so we come out of Vanguard with still a little bit of debt left. You know, a couple of years go by with two additional firms and then you transition to business. And I want to set the stage here and you correct uh a bias I have around this, but I have seen a lot of business owners go into business after accumulating a financial position that gives them a nice cushion that they feel comfortable with. That’s not always the case and there’s plenty of exceptions, but what was your situation like? Was that something you intended to do and did you build a a cushion in order to go into entrepreneurship um a few years ago?
Mark: Yeah, um, I would say the the cushion would be that I had a fairly high discretionary income being that I had a decent salary. I I never really made like six figures, but I didn’t spend that much. And because of that and because I didn’t have that much debt, it makes it so much easier because at the end of the day, the number that you’re, the the, um, the the number that you’re trying to hit, I’m trying to think what the correct word is, but the number you’re trying to hit is basically how much can you pay for your living expenses, maybe plus like a thousand or two. So once you hit that and you have enough money for three, four, five months, that’s entrepreneurship, but basically as you make sure that you have enough money accumulated per month in order to, you know, put food on the table.
Mark: But for me, I mean, starting off, I didn’t even think that I would even become an entrepreneur. It was very much a hobby. I thoroughly enjoyed being online and teaching people personal finance and, you know, I I wanted to get to the point where I wasn’t making millionaires, multi-millionaires. I wanted people that came from my background or look like me. I wanted them to understand the basics, you know, budgeting, paying off debt, investing, how to build a business. So a lot of times when people are like, hey, like, you know, what was your, what was your strategy for building a business? I’m like, it, I fell into it in a way. I accidentally built Better Wallet in a way. Um, so when 2018, 2019 rolled around, that’s when I started thinking, okay, well, how can I take all of these tips and things that I learned from the school of hard knocks in college and working at these, you know, Wall Street firms, how can I take all of that and help the average person do all the things. Um, so I did what any millennial would do and go on online and start talking about it, but at first it was on my personal page and all my friends who were very, I use the word candid with me, said, hey, like, I don’t want to learn anything about this stuff. You should take it and put it on like a different platform. And I was like, you know what, you know what, I’m just going to go and I’m going to put it on a different page.
Mark: So I took one of my my old pages that I had and just like transitioned it to Better Wallet. And I would just go and document my own journey but also adding in different tips of of things that I learned. Um, the first person that followed was my was my auntie and every time I posted, she would leave like a a comment on the bottom like, good job, Mark, you’re doing a great job. I’m like, thanks, auntie. Um, and then that went from one person to 10 to, you know, a hundred to a thousand and kind of took off from there, especially with the help of the pandemic. And again, as I mentioned, like I kind of slipped into this whole business thing because once you start building digital products and those products do different, uh, very well, you have to get record keeping, bookkeeping, then you have to protect your name, right? You have to get the trademarks. And then you look back and you say, wow, like I have everything that you would want within a business, but I happen to be managing the business and my 9-to-5 at the same time.
Mark: Um, and then at a certain point, I had a conversation with a friend that’s very near and dear that Amanda and I, and she was like, Mark, like, how much money are you making? I told her and she was like, you don’t need to work your 9 to 5 anymore. Have you considered making the jump? And I was like, I don’t know anything about being a full-time entrepreneur. I worked so hard to become this executive at this fintech firm. And she was like, you can always go back if it doesn’t work out. And, um, after that conversation, I went back to my, uh, went back to my boss and told him, hey, I’m putting my two weeks and then three years later, we’re here now.
Amanda: Yeah, that is, that is crazy, especially because I feel like becoming a business owner, it sounds like so sexy in theory, but it’s also really scary. So, how did it feel going from like the instability growing up and like sometimes not even knowing where your next meal’s going to come from, right? Then you get, um, interviewed and you get a job at this little place called Vanguard where now you have a lot of stability. And then you go into entrepreneurship where you’re back to instability. The growth potential, of course, is huge, but how did that feel like especially those first few months or even that first year, um, being like a full-time business owner and leaving the 9-to-5 to focus solely on that?
Mark: Yeah, I, um, I would say it was probably like the the common theme of my life. I’ve never, I’ve never felt stable in any form or fashion, right? Like when you’re in foster care, you don’t feel stable because you don’t have a family, then, you know, even after, you know, five years out of foster care, you always think to yourself, well, they can just give me away maybe, like, and you’re constantly like trying to please people in order for them to, you know, like you. And then in college, it was never, like all four years, like I could have got kicked out any year. I ended up getting kicked out freshman year. And even at Vanguard, it was like, I never felt like I belonged in a way. Um, because no one looked like me. No one on the senior executive team looked like me. Um, luckily I had some great mentors that put me underneath their wing.
Mark: Um, but I would probably say the first time that I felt stable was when I owned everything. Um, where I can control the income that’s coming in. I can control who’s working with me, uh, who I decide to partner with. Um, and I would say creating Better Wallet and making that jump has definitely made me think to myself, man, like I feel like more people should, should do this, especially if they feel instability in their life. Um, like even working in finance, you are always constantly worried that you’re going to get laid off. I can’t, I mean, I’m not going to get laid off from my own company. Um, you just work harder and build different products and then next you know, you, uh, you have enough money to to pay, pay yourself. Um, so I would say one from, you know, I guess 29 years of having instability to the last, uh, what, three or four years of being stable because you can control everything that’s around you for the most part.
Scott: So what what um, can you give us a little bit of a an overview of the trajectory of the business, like has it, has it uh, in maybe in relative terms, has it replaced, surpassed, on the path to surpassing the income that you were generating from work a few years back or how’s it going?
Mark: Yeah, no, it’s going, going really well. I mean, it, the first year, first full year, I surpassed my full-time salary. Um, and, you know, I put a lot of time and energy into it. It was also like the pandemic and everything. So I had nothing but to work on the business. Um, last year was a phenomenal year and then this year should be God willing and a million- dollar year, um, given how the first few months have gone. So it’s, uh, it’s definitely taking off beyond my wildest nature. Like I don’t know of people that have, well, I know people now on the internet, but like personally growing up, I didn’t know of anyone who had like a, you know, a million dollar business or, you know, got paid a million dollar in their, uh, throughout the year. So it’s all about like, just staying grounded and focusing on the end mission, right? Like I I think, and Amanda knows this of me, where I don’t, it’s very, this is probably one of the first times that I have even publicly talked about how much money the company brings in because like I am trying to be better with it because there’s a lot of people out there that are on the same journey and they need to hear that for motivation and inspiration and knowing that they can do it. Um, but I’ve always never talked about it, mostly because of my upbringing at Vanguard where Vanguard was really big and, you know, Jack Bogle, the late Jack Bogle would always mention that money is just a byproduct of doing the right thing. Um, we very rarely, even the management positions, like we never talk about how much money was coming in Vanguard, even though they were making millions, billions of dollars. Um, they had four, when I was there, $4 trillion under management and maybe once or twice of my five years of being there, did we ever talk about that, right? It would always be, how can we improve the client experience? How can we make sure we’re doing right by the people? How can we give people a fair chance at financial success? That’s literally their their mission statement. Um, and I definitely have that at the core of what we do at Better Wallet where it’s like, how can we make sure everyone’s good? And if money comes in, that’s great. If we have enough money to eat, that’s great. Um, and then everything else is icing on top of the cake.
Scott: Okay, so I want to I want to backtrack a second here and go to the start of the of the business journey. You put in your two weeks notice. What do your expenses look like at this point in time? How frugally are you living? And did that have any correlation with your confidence in going out in your own with your business?
Mark: Oh yeah, definitely. A lot of a lot of my confidence came from the fact I didn’t spend that much. So at the time, living in Philadelphia, you know, had a nice apartment, not too nice. Um, but after paying off all my debt, so kind of giving you guys the the the timeline. So I pay off my debt, uh, July of 2020. I didn’t leave my full-time job until November of 2021. So I had a full year of not having really any debt, which took up a lot of my income. Um, and that allowed me to not only put some money away, but also just consider the fact that I could leave my job. So, um, that was really helpful. In terms of expenses, um, I was probably spending like 3,500 per month. And with that, you know, 3,500, you multiply that by, you know, three months and, you know, I had that, you know, kind of put away and I said, okay, well, if I make the jump, chances are unless I have a really, really bad month, I’m going to be able to make that up per month. Um, because at that point, I want to say I was making like 15,000 per per month, um, and just, uh, profit. So I thought it would be totally fine. And then that number continued to increase and my expenses haven’t really increased all too much. I mean, Georgia renting is more expensive, I would say, if you want to live in like a a decent area. Um, so that’s something you have to weigh up, but same car, still no debt. Um, maybe a little bit more like business expenses, but otherwise, same old, same old G, same old guy from, uh, from Philadelphia is the same one that’s down here.
Amanda: Yeah, so Mark is 6’2 and, um, I think we were talking like last summer and he’s not even splurging for Economy Plus. So this man is tall and he is stuffing himself back in just a regular old plane seat. So I feel like he takes frugality to the next level. He’s a seven-figure business owner and’s sitting in regular Economy at 6’2. So wanted to add that in.
Mark: It’s um, it’s something where if I’m on a longer flight, and I’m I’m learning. I’m learning, I’m learning to appreciate, uh, Comfort Plus at least. Um, but it’s one of those type of things if I’m on a shorter flight when I, like last week I flew up to Pittsburgh and, you know, I just it was only an hour and a half. I’m like, I can do economy, it’s totally fine. By the time we were in the air, we’re going to be in the air for a half an hour, like we’ll be coming back down. Um, but if I’m flying to California, I definitely pay for Comfort Plus now. It’s really difficult for me to wrap my head around getting first class, um, because Comfort Plus is enough. But again, like a lot of stuff comes from my upbringing. Like my dad wasn’t a fancy guy. Like he just everyone knew who he was, everyone respected him. Um, you know, he was the the coolest guy in my entire town. Uh, and he didn’t have to wear the Gucci, he didn’t have to have like a fancy car or whatever. Um, so a lot of that I still have instilled in into me. Um, but I have a lot of rich friends now, so they are encouraging me to spend more money on things that can make my life a little bit more comfortable. So that’s one one area where I’m looking or hoping to expand in the future without going overboard.
Scott: Well, Mark, where can people find out more about you?
Mark: Yeah, definitely. So you can find, uh, me really anywhere where you see Better Wallet. So Better Wallet on all the social media channels, um, outside of Twitter. Twitter is thee Better Wallet, I’m working on that. Um, or I should say thee Better Wallet is the the screen name. Um, and then Better Wallet on all other things, and you can also find me at thee Better Wallet, um, theebetterwallet.com. So send me a DM. I would love to get to know whoever’s listening personally. Um, I’m really big on if you walk into someone’s house, you have to say hi. Uh, so send me a DM and introduce yourself and I look forward to helping you reach your financial, your uh, financial goals.
Scott: Awesome. Well, thank you so much for sharing your awesome, um, story here. Congratulations on all the success you’ve had and all the the challenges that you’ve overcome uh on your journey so far. And I can’t wait to see what comes next and um what you do over the next 10 years.
Mark: Thank you. I appreciate it. Thank you for having me on.
Scott: All right. That wraps up this episode of the BiggerPockets Money Podcast. She is Amanda Wolf, aka the She-Wolf of Wall Street, and I am Scott Trench saying, see you next time.
Scott: BiggerPockets Money was created by Mindy Jensen and Scott Trench, produced by Hajar L. Edited by Exodus Media, copywriting by Nate Weintruab, and lastly, a big thank you to the BiggerPockets team for making this show possible.
