Follow Cheeky's and Chill on Amazon Music. Just head to Amazon dot com slash Cheeky's and check out even more podcasts by Mike Utura throughout Hispanic Heritage month. Listen to my latest episode of Cheekys and Chill on Amazon Music. At Amazon dot com slash Cheeky's and listen to Cheeky's and Chill on Amazon Music, or ask Alexa to play Cheeky's and Chill on Amazon Music. What do you think is like initially so confusing about the stock market.
I really truly believe that the amount of money that we bring in and that we have is a reflection of how much we value ourselves. There was this deep desire for me to one day have a house that looked like the ones my mom used to clean.
Hello.
Hello, Happy Monday everyone. I hope you all had a really great September and are ready for October.
Oh, my favorite season, you guys. I love it. I love anything punkin and.
Just excited about the fall and feeling a little like, I don't know, fall and winter are my favorite you guys. Anyways, on today's episode, we're going to talk about the stock market. I know this topic can be a little intimidating, which is why I'm excited for all of you to meet today's guest. She's really great at explaining the stock market and teaching us about how we can use it to build wealth. So get ready, this is a good one.
This is cheeky's and chill. So before we introduce today's guest, I just want to give you guys a little disclaimer. This episode is meant to be helpful and informative, but it's not meant to be taken as professional financial advice. Okay, So now that that's out of the way, today's special guest is Linda Garcia. She's a brilliant financial educator who
works to empower communities of color. She's also the host of the podcast Investees and the author of the book Wealth Warrior, Eight Steps for Communities of Color to Conquer the Stock Market. Linda, welcome it is it's so nice to finally meet you. I've heard so many great things about you. We have mutual friends actually too.
Thank you for having me and opening up your space to this conversation.
No, of course, I'm excited.
I think this is something that we definitely need to talk about more in our communities. Especially as Latina as we at least for me, well, my mom was kind of good with showing me how to save money and stuff like that.
I just didn't listen. Now I'm better because I learned the hard way.
But anyways, I did want to ask you a little bit more about you about your background, because I think it's really interesting. A lot of people are like, oh, my god, she's successful, and they don't really see the struggle behind that. They think, oh, her life must have been so easy, and that wasn't necessarily the case for you. You know, you were a mother at fourteen years old, is that correct?
Yeah, at fourteen years old, I became a mother.
I was also in gangs.
I was just.
Living a life that was very challenging. Did I stopped living with my parents at twelve years old, and it was just extreme difficult. Like I truly became the definition of a statistic. I feel like that was much more common back in the nineties, like, oh, she's a statistic, and you kind of get discarded in your family and
extended family and even in society. So that was extremely difficult for me to go through as just a human being, as a child, and to think that I was no longer going to amount to anything because I, you know, had a child. Was disheartening, and so I lived a pretty rough experience. I had positive influences in my life, which became my teachers who really nurtured me in high school. I even lived with one of my teachers at one point in time.
And it's really.
Because of them that I attribute the woman that I've become today, completely because of my teachers.
Yeah, that's awesome because your parents were also immigrants, right, Yes, so you have literally you've worked your way and you've worked very hard to get to this point.
Yes, and I feel like it's still a lot of work. I mean even today just I really love economics and I love learning about what is taking place and the economy just to understand and process how we can navigate the future in a much more strategic way. And even just like today listening to the economy because we just got notified that there will be a pause on rate hikes.
We're trying to tackle inflation for the country, and I'm like listening to these people speak and I'm really trying to keep up, and I'm like, wow, they're so far ahead, and a lot of them, look my age, and will I ever be that intelligent?
Like, there's still so much work.
That goes into what I do on a day to day basis. But I have to remind myself that I'm on my own journey and that I'm not less intelligent. I'm just learning at this point in time, and there's still a lot of room ahead.
The thing that I tell people all the time is not to to compare yourself to other people and their growth and their progress. You know, to focus, and sometimes it's a little hard. It's hard not to, but that you have to remind yourself like, it's okay, We're still learning day by day.
The good thing is.
That there's that desire. We're striving to want to be better in every way. When did this love for the stock market or learning about generational wealth even all of this, Where did it come from? Yeah?
I grew up watching my mom clean houses. She cleaned houses mainly in Laguna Beach, and so I had so much exposure to a lot of money via going with her to going to clean houses. There was this deep desire for me to one day have a house that looked like the ones my mom used to clean, or have celebrations and Christmas dinners or Thanksgivings and the way that they celebrated, like I just watched them with my
mom working, and I wanted that for myself. It wasn't until after I had my daughter that I really had strong ambition. There's something to be said about being a mother. It's almost like it unleashes like a lioness. And even though I was young, it unleashed that for me, and so I had again that deep seated ambition to become something and do something for my daughter and myself and not repeat some of the same stories of the way
I grew up. And so I began to study wealth overall, like I started to look at patterns and just research like how did this person get rich? And mostly everyone I was researching was, of course the way we say old, pale and stale, and so it was just like, you know, all these older white men, and I started to see a pattern, which was every time there was economic hardship like a recession, that was when their wealth would multiply a crazy amount. And so I started to really focus
on that, on those types of patterns. And then I began to work at Netflix, and I had a white colleague that began educating me on the stock market, and I started to understand that there was an opportunity there for me to begin investing and growing my money in that way. And so I started to do that, and I opened up about my investing. One of my good friends, Patti Rodriguez, we were just at the start of our careers back in twenty twelve, and we would talk about
the stock market. We had another friend named Brisia as well, and the three of us would just strategize. Then I just became a student of the market. I ended up investing a total of nine thousand dollars. Those nine thousand dollars turned into half a million dollars. The amount that I was investing was an amount that I could process. It was two hundred dollars a month. And so I was shocked that we never use the stock market as
a vehicle to grow wealth. We think of real estate, we think of entrepreneurship, but we rarely think of about the stock market. And so I started to do more and more research, and I began to understand that only fifteen percent of Americans actually hold direct stock.
Only fifteen per Wow, that's crazy.
And out of those fifteen percent, it's the top ten percent most wealthiest people in the country, so a lot of people don't have access to stock.
It's intimidating.
Even when you open the conversation, you're like, it gives you anxiety, you know, yeah, and that's normal.
Okay, So I think you and I need to have like an even longer conversation just so we could sit down. And I really I think I'm gonna need your help in my life because you're right. I think, Okay, we grow up in gon Bratucasa. You need to buy your house and that's where and yes, yes, that's I think that that's great. But I've been intimidated is the word to invest and put my money in the stock market,
and thank goodness for you. Now I'm like okay, and I'm hoping our listeners as well are kind of like okay. Even if it doesn't have to be a large, large amount, it could be. Like you said, you started with nine thousand dollars, which is still a lot for a lot of people, but still can you start with one thousand dollars?
Yes, And so I want to be very clear as well, it was two hundred dollars a month.
How I started, So Okay, yes.
The nine thousand was over the span of three years, but I was just investing little chunks every single month and being consistent. I think the biggest message I want to convey, and I think to bring you a little bit at ease Cheeky's, is like, it's really easy for us to walk into an Apple store and purchase a phone, purchase a computer, air pods, whatever the case may be. We are not afraid to walk into Apple and purchase products.
For the most part, right we understand that we can use those products as an investment and start a business off of our phone. We understand the value of it. And so the way I want folks to start looking at the stock market is in the same way. I want you to not just be a consumer of the products, because we are some of the biggest consumers in our
community in the United States. I want you to start to look at the opportunity of being a shareholder and owning a piece of Apple as well as purchasing the product and then getting the benefit of the stock increasing in value and then your investment increasing in value. It's easy for us to think about purchasing a home because our ancestors, our family members, our community members have all
broken the barriers of doing that. It's a common experience for us to purchase a home, but it's also still very challenging for folks to save twenty percent. Real estate is very expensive in places like California and New York, and you have to have a stable job for two years and have credit. There's all of these barrier to entry.
In order to get started with the stock market, all you need is your Social Security number, you open an account, and then you can start building your portfolio and start building assets.
It's really that simple.
Owning a house requires more effort on your part than purchasing a.
Stock Okay, so the first step for sure is open an account.
Yeah, so that's the first step in action, and I go through that in my book.
I lay it out really easily.
I even go through the steps of how to open the account, how to fill out the form. I just lay it out so that you can do it like you can execute it. At the core of all of this work, so the very first step before you open the account, I want you to be aware of the emotional work that you're going to do as you move through the process. Because we can take in all of the financial literacy, whether it's to buy real estate or to buy stocks, or how to invest or save for
a retirement. All we want, but if we're not focusing on our mindset and our scarcity, then it's going to be real, really difficult for us to really be able to multiply our money in ways that we've never imagined. If we fear losing money, if we're emotionally attached and fear investing into ourselves or into anything else, that's going to be our biggest roadblock. And for so many of us child of immigrants, it's easy for us to get caught up in scarcity or fears of their.
Not being enough outside of us.
So I always like to share that the first most important step is going to be working on your money stories, your money wounds, and that's what I go over in the first chapter of the book. I find it really important to cover that first, especially from where we come from and not having these types of opportunities and being intimidated from participating in the stock market, so all of that is really important.
I absolutely love that because I'm a firm believer in what you think, what you say, it's what you attract, you know, so it's all literally mind, body and soul. Where do we go to set up an account to start trading? Is there like a minimum amount as well?
Great question.
So it's really important for me to convey that I would like for folks to stay away from online platforms, so to speak. When I say online platforms, I mean like Robinhood type platforms. I've been saying this for a really long time for years now. They really target people of color. There's a lot of things that have gone wrong with that company in terms of giving people accounts
that were not the right accounts for the person. They've been known to overcharge on the price of a stock more than what the stock is actually valued for at the time, and we may not notice because it's a few cents, but all of those things matter. And here's the other thing. When you start investing, you want to go to a company that is established and that has the back king. Especially during challenging economic times. You don't want to go to a new company that was just established.
You want to go with the old money. That's the way we're going to be the safest. There's two brokerage accounts out there. One of them is really great just because they have fractional shares. So let me explain really quickly what a fractional share is. Let's say you want an Apple share and the Apple share costs one hundred dollars, and you right now don't have the budget to buy
the share for one hundred dollars. With a fractional share, you can just invest five dollars, ten dollars, fifty dollars, seventy five dollars, one dollar if you wanted to buy a piece of a share, so you don't need a
minimal amount. You can start with whatever you have. And the way I like for our community to start is the way I say it is, start with what you're okay with losing, just because I want you to emotionally unattach yourself from money and not be like, oh my gosh, my money if the stock market comes down a little, which it will and sometimes it'll come down a lot. I don't want you to have anxiety or overwhelm over
what the money is doing. I want you to learn to emotionally break away from the money and just invest it and watch what it feels like to let go of money and have money work for you. It can feel painful in the short amount of time because it's volatile. But in years from now, you're gonna be grateful that you begin to do that type of work of letting go of money and begin investing it, and you're gonna be able to see the return on your investment. So
there's no minimum to start. Fractional shares can be found in a company like Fidelity. There's also e Trade. There's several big companies I list them in the book as well that you can open your brokerage account with.
So you guys, so you have to read the book, Okay, but still we're gonna get as much as we can from Linda today. But you even say that that got recipients can also enter the stock market as well, so that's great to know.
Yeah.
So all you need is either an iti in number or a Social Security number. So if you're a DOCA recipient, you can start building your assets and start building your portfolio. You can use your portfolio as leverage for when you do want to buy a house. It counts as part
of your net worth. It's important for me to also convey that you can get started from the day that you are born, the day that you're given an iti in number, or the day that you're given a Social Security number, you can start building your assets and have a portfolio. So for any parents out there that have younger children or nieces and nephews, you can start a custodial account and that is an account that you manage
for a child in your life. When they turn eighteen, that portfolio, it comes their portfolio.
So how do you determine which stocks you should buy into? Like, are there any tips anything that you recommend?
Absolutely?
So the way I want you all to look at this is I want you to think of the companies that are mostly used a lot of the times folks think, oh the stock market, I need to find a needle in a haystack, or what's going to be the next big thing. I don't want you to think that way. I want you to think about the companies that we are all dependent on. What phone do you use, what computer do you use? What are you turning on when
you're watching television? Like I literally want you to think of what you're most dependent on in your day to day and then once you look at what you're dependent on, I want you to start to see what everyone else is dependent on as well. So it's the products that everyone is using, like are you shopping at Target or are you shopping at Walmart. I just want you to look at the companies that you solely depend on and
that everyone else does as well. I don't want you to try and find the next big thing that becomes a little bit more challenging and riskier. You want to invest into companies that you use, that you consume, and then I want you to look at it like building a pantry. So think of your pantry. And I don't recommend that you try to invest in a ton of different companies. I want you to stay focused and look
at it as like Geksa. So let's think of something very simple, like one company look at it as like Aros. Another company look at it as fri Holos. Another company look at it as Dorthias, and every month comps Una tortilla, month after month after month, and then eventually you're going to have una. Oh Yeahros Dortias, you know, to serve not just for you, but for your entire families. So that's kind of the way I want folks to look
at it. It's companies that we consume and that we know we can't live without.
That is perfect because I love food and I'm a very visual person. So now I could be like get and I'm gonna turn that into a freaking feast.
Yes, that's like an.
Awesome way of like okay, cool, you got meh Okay, that's awesome.
Okay.
Is there a good or a bad time to start or or to buy stock.
There's a great time to buy stock, and it's typically when the market is down, and so we only get those opportunities every ten years. We're in one of those opportunities right now. So typically the stock market will crash every ten years. We just recently had a crash. We had two back to back crashes during COVID because of the pandemic and then again because of the war with Ukraine and Russia, and so the stock market comes down.
You have to look at it as like these companies are a lot cheaper than what they were a few years ago, so you're starting to buy them at a cheaper price, and then we can anticipate for the stock market to begin its recovery, which it has. It's been a year almost in October that it has been recovering. And we can anticipate based on historical patterns that it
will continue to grow in the next ten years. So this is actually one of the best times to get started on your investing journey and understanding the process of the market and remembering that it's not a sprint, it's
a marathon. And you know, I'm working diligently to create resources so that we can understand and digest the information from a completely different perspective, from a child of immigrants, from someone that was deep in scarcity mindset that I work to overcome that on a day to day basis.
Do you think because you still started how long ago you said investing in the stock market?
I started in twenty thirteen, so ten years ago.
Okay, ten years ago, and do you think things have changed? You think it's still possible to do what you did, like invest the amount that you've invested and made the amount that you've made absolutely always.
So you know, someone that we are really familiar with in terms of the amount of wealth that they have is Warren Buffett. When he started when he was eleven years old investing in the stock market, and so that's what's gotten him to where he is today. And he started with McDonald's, Johnson and Johnson and Coca Cola, and so he still holds a lot of those investments to this day. And so I want us to look at the stock market as an opportunity for us to invest
in America. That's something that Warren Buffett always says, like, why wouldn't you want to own a piece of America, one of the biggest, most wealthiest countries in the world. We'd want to own the companies that have come out of this country. So I foresee the stock market being a viable investment for centuries generations to come. I think what holds us back is definitely the lack of knowledge.
Like we're not taught these things in school. Most of the stock market education is generational knowledge, which is equivalent to generational wealth.
It's really interesting for me.
I have a seven year old son and then I have my twenty nine year old daughter that I had when I was a teen, and I've gotten to see the difference in the way both of them think. Don't get me wrong, my daughter is incredible. She owns the school, She's very successful in her own right. I'm very proud of her.
And you should be. I'm like, my eyes are cheering up. This is amazing. Okay, it's because I'm so sorry.
This is coming from like where you came from and you had her at fourteen, like this is this is amazing and you should be so proud of yourself, like it just girl, Oh my god.
We have to go to dinner anyways, go ahead.
Let's do it. Meet you and Patty. We gotta make it happy. Yes, yes, yeah, So.
You know, I've gotten to see the way she has moved through life and navigated it in her struggles where my son is in a completely different world. He was watching a wrestling movie and in the movie there was this man that goes into the restaurant to hold up to like steal the money from the cash register, using his finger and hiding his hand over his jacket. My son pauses the movie and says, I feel so bad
for him. And I was like the guy getting robbed, the kid under the table, Like who do you feel bad for? And he's like, I feel bad for the man that is robbing the restaurant. And I was like why. He's like, because he's just looking for money, and I was like, yeah, you're right, Yeah, he is just looking for money. And he's like and he doesn't know where to get money, and I was like, and where do you get money?
And he's like the stock market. He was three.
I gotta love it.
I love that.
So and that's what I mean, right, is like that's generational wealth. Like I might think, oh, no, miss that lacion or not. He doesn't know what's going on in my life, but he was three years old and able to understand that you get money from the stock market, and so I.
Think, like that's also generational wealth.
Is like the knowledge that we acquire and the things that we start paying attention to will be the things that our children pay attention to. Just like a lot of us that are children of immigrants and watched our parents.
Work really hard.
Our perception of making money is a lot different than someone that didn't break their back or hurt their mental health trying to put food on the table. So I think this education is really important for our communities.
Absolutely, And I think that's what it is, lack of it information because so many people are afraid but because they don't know, you know, but I want demos, Like it's like I don't want to seem dumb, so I'd rather not ask, you know. And it's like, no, there's so much power in asking questions and informing yourself. I'm so happy about that that we're able to talk about this. And what do you think is like like initially so confusing about the stock market?
Oh, it has its own language. It's like speaking a foreign language. There's so many terms and abbreviations.
There's so much.
But I put a glossary in the back of the book. I break things down with analogies. I help you process and understand. I paint the picture for you so that you can really grasp what they're saying. I refuse that we not participate in the stock market because we don't understand the language. And so that's why it was so important for.
Me to begin teaching this.
You know, the book is in libraries, it's a resource, it's accessible. We no longer can say like that we don't have the resources because I'm working really hard to create those on a day to day basis amazing.
I love it, and I love the colors that you chose, and it just it's fun. And do you recommend companies where they have financial advisors and then they say, Okay, how much money do you want to put in the stock market? Do you recommend something like that, or is it just better to do it yourself. So this is a really great question. I love this question.
This is going to be different for different folks depending on the budget that you have, because sometimes financial advisors require for you to have a certain amount of money to begin investing, so you have the liberty to do it.
On your own.
But if you want to have a financial advisor, I think that that's great as well. And here is my perspective on this. Everyone has money wounds, everyone has fears on different scales. Right, it looks different for everybody. So I just want you to understand that when you have a financial advisor, just because they're a financial advisor, that doesn't mean that they don't have their own money stories and their own fears. So they may be making decisions on your money that is right for them, and it
may not necessarily be right for you. But if you don't understand the stock market at all, you might not even know what is right for you. I get so many messages from folks that read my book and then come back and say, I asked my financial advisor about all these things I was learning, and my financial advisors like, how did you know that?
How who's talking to you? Who else are you talking to?
And they're like, I just read your book, you know, And so I think this is good for us to know what financial advisors are doing with our money and find one that is right for you. The book arms you in order to have a strong dialogue and question what they're doing and understand what they're doing with your money.
Is there anything else, Linda, that you would like to like that we didn't talk about that you would like to add?
Is there something that I a question I missed?
I think we pretty much covered it all. I think, if anything, what I would like to share is touching on the being positive. It's important for us to understand that we are capable of doing so much more than we understand at this current moment in time, and that everything that is around you right now in this moment, every article, whether it's our clothing, the chair that you're sitting on, the cup at your desk, the headphones, whatever it is, all of that was a thought in someone's mind.
That was a thought, and so everything starts as a thought. Without our thoughts, there is no money. So at the core of money, at the core of currency, is only our thoughts.
Without us.
Money doesn't exist like money exists because we think and then we turn what we think into something that creates value in other people's lives and then generates money. So at the core of what I want you to take away from today is to understand that your mind is unlimited. Despite of your circumstances where you come from, how much money you have or you don't have, Everything you need
is within your mind. And so the stock market, for me, is just a component to help the money that you've brought in, to help you multiply that money in different ways and perceive money from a completely different space. And so I don't want for anyone to walk away from this to think that the stock market is not for them. It is absolutely for you. And the knowledge that comes
with understanding the stock market is priceless. It is priceless because you're getting to understand business from a completely different perspective. Like most of the publicly traded companies are companies that are to some extent dictating our lives and the technology that we use and how we move on a day to day basis, and getting to understand how these companies work as an investor in these companies is so valuable.
So I think, if anything, I would just like for folks to take that away, that it's not just about learning about the stock market. It's a much more deeper experience that happens internally with our money mindset and then is reflected in money form in our portfolio.
In our part.
Yeah, and so it's safe to say that you truly believe that manifestation or spirituality, whatever you want to call it, is definitely connected to your wealth. Like it's all, it's all intertwined.
It is a reflection, and it's so hard for us to sometimes come to terms with that because we've seen so much scarcity or injustice in marginalized communities. But when we continue to focus on that versus focus on our internal power and what we can create, then that's what's
going to be manifested for ourselves and our lives. I really truly believe that the amount of money that we bring in and that we have is a reflection of how much we value ourselves internally, and the faster that we can come to terms with that realization, the faster that we can value ourselves even more and ask for higher paying wages at our jobs as latinas and demand for what we deserve.
Yes, it's valuing ourselves and giving us our place, you know. And what I always tell you guys, knowledge is power, you know, and this is a great way. Like for me, I'm going to definitely read this book because it's something that I've been thinking about for a long time, but I've been too afraid.
That's just the truth, and that's what it is.
Like the more knowledge you have about a certain subject, the more confident you feel about speaking about it, about doing it, about taking that step. You completely change my mindset and the perspective that I had on the stock market, like in just this conversation, so I could just imagine reading and finishing the book. So honestly, thank you, thank you so much.
Before you go.
You have a podcast called Investies.
Yeah, thank you so much for sharing your platform and being so generous. Investies is a passion project with myself and another production company where we break down economics and the stock market and very easy terms. I give definitions. I don't just speak at you. I'm speaking to you and explaining what is happening in the economy and with the stock market. It's super short, eight to twenty minutes long,
depending on what type of news is happening. We also like to, you know, keep it real and infuse some spirituality in there, because you know, we're spiritual beings and money spiritual.
I love it. Oh my goodness, I'm so good.
I'm gonna listen to it, you guys, listen to investies and listen to Cheeky's and chill. Okay, okay, and you're book. Okay, so the book is called again you guys. Wealth Warrior Eight Steps for Communities of Color to Conquer the Stock Market. Can you share your your socials with us?
Yes, absolutely so you can find me on Instagram at Lou's Warrior.
Luz Okay, awesome, all right, yes, so Loose Warrior. You guys follow her. I hope that you guys enjoyed this episode. Linda, You've been amazing. Thank you for what you're doing for the world, for our community, for making it so easy to understand. I think this is what we all needed. And I'm super inspired. I really am an inspired to like go and invest you know in where we live, and we deserve it, you guys, We deserve to own a piece of America. Honestly, you put it in the
best way and you guys before you go. You know, I always have my motivational quote, and the motivational quote for the day is wealth consists not in having great possessions, but in having few wants another one. The goal is it more money. The goal is financial. Them those I thought were great for today's you know subject and what we're talking about. And again, Linda Quelina like, I love this conversation and I hope you enjoyed it too. So thank you guys so much. Thank you for listening to
this episode. And yeah, it's definitely gonna be one that I'm going to listen to over and over all. Right, guys, thank you, thank you. Do you need advice on love, relationships, health emails? I'm so excited to share with you that my Cheeky's and Chill podcast will have an extra episode drop each week. I'll be answering all your questions. Just leave me a voice message. All you have to do is go to speak pipe dot com slash Cheekys and Chill Podcast and record your questions.
I can't wait to hear from you.
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