Money Tales

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Rikki Quintana. For most of her adult life, Rikki has been haunted by a vivid image of a woman in a flower sack dress, sitting under a bridge with a shopping cart. That woman is the personification of Rikki’s bag lady syndrome that she recently came to terms with. This fear stemmed from a chaotic childhood where Rikki couldn’t rely on the adults in her...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Natalie Morales. You’re probably already familiar with Natalie who is a current host of "The Talk" on CBS, which she recently joined after a 15-year run on the “Today Show.” Natalie is an ambitious, focused, and talented journalist who determined early in her career that she wanted to be a successful reporter. To get started, she had to take a 50% pay c...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Matina Agio, joining us from Athens, Greece. When Matina talks about inheritance as 'the value transferred from one generation to another', she’s not necessarily focused on the money. For her money is just a symbol, and what people are really after are rich experiences. The Greeks call this Eudaimonia, which means the condition of 'human flourishing'. I...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Melissa Houston. Melissa is someone who knows a lot about the importance of money conversations, and she has faced the consequences of not having them at critical times. Well into her career as a CPA, Melissa found herself slowly unraveling, which made it difficult for her to see a big problem was mounting. It began with weekend shopping trips; a handba...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Elisabeth Leamy. Elisabeth is a nationally-known journalist, author and speaker, best known for her work as the on-air Consumer Correspondent for Good Morning America. Among many world leaders, she’s had the privilege to have an exclusive interview with President Barack Obama, where they covered Wall Street reform, the consumer protection act, and what...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Gina Yashere. Gina is currently producing, writing and acting in the sitcom “Bob Hearts Abishola” on CBS, which she co-created with Chuck Lorre. Gina harnesses risk to get what she wants in life – she was a successful standup comic in the UK, who had her eyes set on America. Gina took money that was earmarked for taxes in England and used it to finance...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Rebecca DiLiberto. Many of Rebecca’s gifts in life were born out of losses she endured; at a young age her parents divorced, her father died when she was in college, and her brother survived a freak accident that devastated his brain. These three events taught Rebecca that money is about building a world to treasure the experiences with the people she l...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Vicky Benzing. Vicky enjoyed an extremely successful career in tech and then decided to pursue an encore career as a stunt pilot, where she performs heart-stopping moves in airshows across the country. In both careers, she was often one of the only leading women which led to some interesting money stories. Born and raised in California, Vicky is an acco...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Gerry Valentine. Gerry is one of the 6%. He was born to a single mother within a very low-income minority neighborhood in New York City, and it was a life where they often did without things that most people would consider necessities. Gerry became one of the 6% who are able to change the trajectory of their lives. He navigated unseen ladders to catapul...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Hunter Marckwardt. Hunter has become a master of productive money conversations. To him, it's all about the why, which to Hunter means understanding what's important to people and helping them focus on achieving it. At work, he leads his team in weekly money conversations that range from budgeting to estate planning and ongoing learning. Hunter consiste...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Dr. Ido Cohen. Money was confusing for Ido when he was growing up. His mom and dad had very different cultural orientations and mindsets about money. As a result, there weren’t many money discussions happening in the household. It wasn’t until Ido traveled to India as a young adult that he started to refine his own views about money. India was different...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Kraig Kann. As a child, Kraig dreamt of becoming a professional sportscaster. That’s all he wanted to do, and sure enough, that’s what he did. Kraig became a huge success. He enjoyed a 25-year television career, including 17 years at Golf Channel/NBC. Kraig was one of the first to interview Tiger Woods as Tiger turned professional, he was hanging with A...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Orion Griffiths. You know the street performers who catch your attention when you’re hanging-out in touristy areas? They entertain and delight you. At the end, you find yourself compelled to drop money in their jar. Street performing is one of Orion’s paid artistic endeavors, where he can bring in hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. He’s that good!...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Alex Batdorf. Alex was a co-founder and CMO of a multi-million dollar backed e-commerce company. Five years into that business, Alex found herself “in the company” instead of being “on top of it”. She realized that her purpose and pursuit of profit were imbalanced because she forgot what she was pursuing the profit for. Ultimately, listening to her body...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Juan Thomas. Juan grew up in suburban Chicago and as an African American, he saw a different level of privilege when hanging-out with white kids and felt out of place in both worlds. When he attended Morehouse college, he did a deep dive on African American theological giants, inspiring him to become a servant leader. Juan also wanted to be the first bl...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Finka Jerkovic. We all know it's hard to change our money habits and bad money behaviors. Finka has figured out some key techniques that have reliably allowed her to change course and to value money as a resource for fueling her and her family’s values and dreams. Finka shares these techniques with us so we all have an opportunity to learn and apply the...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Dave Goetsch. Dave is a Hollywood comedy writer with a passion for helping people engage with their personal finances. You’ve likely enjoyed his work if you’ve watched “United States of Al” and “The Big Bang Theory.” Dave knows it's empathy that connects people to the characters he brings to life on the screen. Understanding that money conversations can...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Bhaj Townsend, a woman who has grace by her side and as her compass. Bhaj has done it all! She nearly became a professional tennis player. She next became a successful restaurant entrepreneur. During a break, she became a longshorewoman. Bhaj then got into commercial real estate and was next offered the opportunity to tour the world as a jazz guitarist....

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Janet Gregory. Janet is a successful Silicon Valley tech maven and the breadwinner of her family. She was an early employee at a start-up in the late 90s and wasn’t sure if the business plan would take off. Much to her delight—it did—the company IPO’d and the stock price went through the roof … and then the dot-com bubble burst followed. As the stock we...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is John Foley. John is a former lead solo pilot of the Blue Angels. Being up in the sky, flying 18 inches apart from the next plane at 500 miles per hour requires intense communication and a deep understanding of what your role is. Also critical to this level of success is having trust in your team, and a commitment to continuous learning. As you’ll hear,...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Tania Vasallo. Growing up in a society where men were in charge of money and everything else, this dynamic woman flipped those rules on their head. Tania grew up in Spain and it wasn’t until she spent a year studying in the US at age 15 that she had her first taste of true freedom. For Tania, this was the freedom to take ownership of herself and her dec...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Rabbi Steve Leder. Rabbi Steve has had a remarkable career impacting the lives of many and he’s not done. In addition to being the Senior Rabbi of Wilshire Boulevard Temple in Los Angeles, he’s also known as being a modern, wise man who, as you’ll hear in this episode is warm, kind, funny, deep and nonjudgmental. All of this from a man who at age 14 was...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Rebecca Macieira-Kaufmann. Rebecca has been leading a fast-paced, globetrotting life as a CEO of multinational businesses. She is publishing her first book titled the “Fit CEO” in September 2021. The book covers how to be the leader of your life: physically, emotionally, spiritually and mentally. Like most things in life, you can apply these principals...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Naseema McElroy. Naseema found herself nearly a million dollars in debt, working as a nurse. She knew she couldn’t out-earn her financial ignorance. In less than three years, Naseema became financially smart and debt-free. She is now focused on making her finances work for her so that she can spend time on the things most important to her — ¬raising and...

In this episode of Money Tales, our guest is Janine Quijije. Janine became a single mom at a young age in a community of immigrants, going through the motions and not striving for more. All that changed when Janine looked down at her five year-old daughter’s face and realized she needed to create something different for her daughter. Janine got curious and set out to create her own career path, do...