Nicole Victoria - More Money Now: A Millennial’s Guide to Financial Freedom and Security

Praise for More Money Now

More Money Now goes where most financial education books dontNicole Victoria actually provides actionable insights and monetary suggestions, while tackling the taboo subject of subconscious beliefs surrounding money. I believe this book is going to help people from every walk of life.

Alexandra Fasulo , author of Freelance Your Way to Freedom

In a world filled with finance bros and out-of-touch academics, Nicoles self-made story and empathetic approach cuts through the noise. Instead of wagging a finger from an ivory tower, Nicole gets right at the heart of our failed relationship with money. I had a mind blown moment when she described how our money mindset is shaped by the age of seven and rarely ever relearned. Slapping a budget-Band-Aid on that innate issue rarely results in lasting improvement. If youre ready to change your relationship with money and start building serious wealth, More Money Now will show you how.

Jeremy Schneider , retired at 36, founder of Personal Fi nance Club

This book is an eye opener. More Money Now will absolutely change your psychology around money. In a world of job insecurity and high inflation, the information presented in this book is important now more than ever. Its filled with practical strategies to make meaningful progress towards securing the financial future of you and your lov ed ones.

Jim Chuong , Canadian Million aire Coach

More

Money

Now

A Millennials Guide
to Financial Freedom
and Security

Nicole Victoria

Coral Gables

Copyright 2022 by Nicole Victoria.
Published by Mango Publishing, a division of Mango Publishing Group, Inc.

Cover Design: Morgane Leoni
Layout & Design: Megan Werner

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More Money Now: A Millennials Guide to Financial Freedom and Security

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication number: 2022937191
ISBN: (p) 978-1-64250-948-9 (e) 978-1-64250-951-9
BISAC category code BUS050030, BUSINESS & ECONOMICS / Personal Finance / Money Management

Printed in the United States of America

For my husband Justin, and children Liam and Zachary.
Even though I did not come from a wealthy family, a wealthy family will come from me.

Contents

How to Use This Book

Depending on where youre at in your life right now, when you think of feeling secure with your money, it might seem like an imposs ible task.

Maybe for you, money has always seemed complicated. Maybe it was something you were brought up to believe was a taboo topic, something you didnt discuss with family or friends. Maybe you believe that because youre not good with math, you absolutely couldnt be good w ith money.

Maybe you are stuck in the fixed mindset that where you are right now has to be where you remain forever. That where you came from dictates where you get to go in life. That if you didnt come from money or marry into money, you are forever going to be someone who struggles with money because thats just the wa y life is.

Maybe you have debt (hello student loans and credit cards), and you feel like youll always be playing catch-up. Maybe youve tried to get help before, tried to budget, followed traditional advice, but it just doesnt work for you. Maybe youre stressed, overwhelmed, and feeling stuck because you dont know where things w ent wrong.

Ive been in many of these places myself. I grew up in a lower middle-class household with no one to teach me about money, let alone saving and investing. Personal finance wasnt taught in school or at home, or so I thought. The crazy thing is, even if you dont believe you were taught about money, you actually were. You were taught by the things you saw and experienced, what you heard your parents or caregivers say and do, and what your life experiences were as a child. Without someone there to truly guide us on the best ways to do things, our financial problems can fester and grow.

Did you realize that by the time you were seven years old, youd already created the internal money rules and scripts youd use to run your entire life? And if you dont take the time to relearn and update them, at twenty, thirty, forty, and fifty years old, those same rules are used to make your financial decisions around spending, saving, debt, and more? Your seven-year-old self, who believed in the tooth fairy, created the rules you could be using today to make decisions that can fundamentally impact your entire life. Scary sh it, right?

By the age of ten, I was taught (unintentionally) that credit cards were emergency funds and that if you saved money, you were just a different breed of person. That wealthier family members just got lucky, and people who saved instead of spending all their dollars were cheap. That success was how much shit you owned, and the more expensive your car, the better off you were. I saw my family struggle with money, and I told myself, That isnt going to be me. I wanted so desperately to get lucky, like the other people who had built wealthso I did what most people do in search of a better life: I went to university so I could become more educated, get a better and higher-paying job, and then get all the wealth and success that was supposed to come alon g with it.

Instead, I ended up graduating with $40,000 in student loan debta lot of which Id spent on clothes and margaritasand working a job that didnt bring the bags of cash I was promised. And I know Im not alone in the belief (and misconception) that success with money is as easy as signing up for a four-year degree at any post-secondary institutionregardless of what your major is, and taking out student loans to pay for it (because of course youll be financially successful after graduation, and wont have any trouble paying those loans back). Well, suffice it to say that was a crock of shitbecause there I was, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, graduating with a business degree, in my cushy corporate job, not feeling any further ahead financially then I was before my foray into tens of thousands of dollar s of debt.

Like many of you reading this, I was at that age where I wanted to get married, buy a house, and feel financially stable enough for kids maybe even get to say yes to guac at a restaurant without thinking about the cost but I was living from paycheck to paycheck with $0 in savings, and I had no idea how I was going to be able to turn it around. I had no idea what to do, because the roadmap to success I had been sold in high school actually just turned out to be a debt trap.

The rules I had been taught about money, success, and wealth werent working for me. I thought maybe the problem was that I just didnt make enough money, yet. I thought the corporate job was the golden ticket, but maybe I just needed a promotion. But when I looked around at the people who had the job title above mine, they seemed to be in a similar situation. Maybe some of them had experienced the wedding, bought the house, and had the kids, but they werent more financially stable or secure. They were stressed and living under mounting piles of debt to keep up with their dr eam life.