NWX-CFPB HQ (US) Moderator: Heather Brown April 2, 2019 1:00 pm CT Coordinator: Welcome and thank you for standing by. All participants are in listen-only mode until the question and answer session of today’s conference. At that time, you may press star 1 on your phone, to ask a question. Today’s call is being recorded. If you have any objections, you may disconnect at this time. I would now like to turn the conference over to Heather Brown. You may begin. Heather Brown: Thank you Operator. Welcome everybody. I’m glad we have a good crowd online today. We’re going to get started. This is the first part of a four part series on Your Money Your Goals. And I have the dates for the other parts listed here. I have to give my standard disclaimer. This presentation is being made a Consumer Financial Protection Bureau representative, on behalf of the bureau. It does not constitute legal interpretation, guidance or advice of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Any opinions or views stated by the presenters are the presenters’ own and may not represent the Bureau’s views. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau regulates the offering and provision of consumer financial products and services, under the Federal Consumer Financial laws, and educates and empowers consumers to make better and informed decisions. And at this - this program is being sponsored by the CFPB FinEx program, Financial Education Exchange, in which we have over 5000 financial educators, social workers, coaches, counselors and various other professionals that provide adult education in the area of consumer financial literacy. So, this just kind of gives an overview of some of the things that we do. If you’re not a member, the email is at the bottom of your screen and you can send in a request to become - to be placed on the list. And you will receive advance notification of the conferences, as well as information on anything upcoming like research, new tools that come out. This slide is a picture of the screen that you’ll see on our financial educators’ Web page. It changes with the webinar that’s being offered. That’s the most upcoming webinar. And you can see the link at the bottom of the page, so you can also check back there to know what’s going on with webinars. And we have just the links that are too, some of the other things that you might find helpful. Again, the first one, our adult financial education Web page. By going to that page and clicking in our search box, you can pretty much find all of our resources. If you need some guidance there’s an inventory of resources that’s on that page that provide you a list of some of our most popular resources and how to access them and what to do with them. So, that might be of help to you. We also have the email here. Again, any questions you have on the program, if you send it to that box, it will come to me, Heather Brown. And I am the program lead for that and I will respond as quickly as possible, generally within 24-48 hours, unless I’m out on leave. To sign up for discussion group, basically you just go into LinkedIn and you can put in our group numbers that’s at the bottom of this link, or just click this link. And you will be able to sign up to be on there. I’ll get a list of people about twice to three times a month, sometimes more depending on what’s going on. I will go in and accept people that have requested to be members of the LinkedIn exchange. And we welcome you to post anything about upcoming financial literacy events for adults - tools, research, questions if you want your colleagues to help you with some information. And other interesting articles that you might find. We just ask that you limit marketing to things that may be organizational based and not necessarily trying to earn dollars that way. Okay. Thank you so much for joining us. And just so you know, the next webinar is going to be this coming Tuesday, coming up, April 9th and we welcome you to attend that and also spread the word to others about it. And that ends my introductory presentation. I’m going to switch the presentation over so that we have the slides you’re going to use for the remainder. And by the way, anyone that provided their name and email address, will receive a copy of the slides. So, you don’t have to worry about that. Excuse me just a minute. I’m having trouble getting the other slide up. There we go. Okay. So, we’re all set and I’m going to hand it over to Scott Bennett, who is going to be our presenter for these session. And Scott, you should be getting a request to be presenter. [Brief silence] Scott Bennett: Hopefully. Well great, well I haven’t seen the request yet, but I believe I’m probably - it looks like I’m linked up there. Great. Well I’m going to great started. So, thank you very much Heather and thank you everyone for joining us today. I definitely appreciate your attention as we go forward through these slides. There are a couple of times where I would just make sure that everybody’s keyboards work and so I’ll have a couple of little, you know, maybe a little interaction type of activities that I’d love to have everyone’s feedback on. And so, at those points there’s the chat box over on the right side of your screen. And feel free to, you know, definitely reply as necessary. I definitely appreciate your input on that. So, with that, we’ll get started. This is going to be the four-part series that’s going to cover a lot of resources around the CFPB’s Your Money Your Goals suite of resources. So, just like Heather I also have to have a disclaimer. But since I am not a representative of the Bureau mine’s a little longer. So, I am a consultant for ICF to - we’re contracting for the CFPB to provide this presentation. So, of course the - you know, any of the opinions that I state does not constitute any legal interpretation, guidance or advice of the Bureau. And so my opinions are mine and mine alone; not the Bureau’s. So, with that out of the way, let’s get started. So, obviously I’d love to start off with a quick opening activity. So, let’s - again, let’s see how everyone’s - if they’re paying attention right now and we can use that chat box off to the right side. So, what I’m going to do is just see what people think. So, into the chat box let’s see how many different words, phrases, sayings, songs or associations you have with the word money. So, when you think of the word money, what comes to mind? Maybe feelings; again, any associations. What are those - what’s the first thing that comes to mind when you think of money? Is there a particular song? So, we’ve got tool. Thank you. Yes. It definitely can be a tool. What are some of the other things here that people think of? You know, is there a particular song? I always hear the Pink Floyd - the cash register sound from that song that they sing. So, that’s the one I always think of. Anybody else? [Brief silence]The best things in life are free. I love that phrase. That’s perfect. So, if you can, make sure you’re using the chat box, because I think we actually have a question option in there, and I can’t see those yet. So, we’ve got savings, banking, freedom, credit, retirement, comfort, vacation. Excellent. Excellent. So, yes, you know, again hopefully everyone’s, you know, starting thinking while we’re doing this, even if you didn’t type out one, hopefully you already started getting thinking about what money means to you. What is your reaction when you think of money? Did you cringe the second you heard the word money, or did you light up? Was it something positive to you? Well money itself is just any generally accepted medium of exchange. So actually, one of the first replies is the tool. It helps us purchase goods. So, but we think of - obviously it’s much more than that. We think about all the different things that came to mind, relief. Yes. You know, when you think about all the different things that come to mind when you think of the word money. You know, just - we can - maybe it starts bringing up feelings or memories or just whatever it means to you. It obviously is much more than just any generally accepted medium of exchange. So, where does that come from? So, we’ve got, you know, whether it’s, you know, from your family, peers, school, media; yes, the advertisement that you see regularly. These associations come from a lot of different sources. And so, how that reflects our attitudes and our feelings about money, well our attitudes and our feelings about money might be rooted in some of those associations. So, again, if you’ve got those positive associations they might start coming out in some of the attitudes that we have around money. And so, when we get into these - how those attitudes and the feelings are related to those behaviors and actions that we have, around money, well those behaviors and actions are often driven by those attitudes and feelings. This is part of the reason why our knowledge - what we know is good practice with money, and sometimes those our knowledge and our actions don’t always line up. We know we should take a particular action. We know we should, but we don’t, for whatever reason. So, what that means is when we’re working with people we serve, well the attitudes and feelings with how they may drive the practices and actions, the - when we understand the origins of these attitudes and feelings we have around money, it can help other people understand the reasons behind some of their actions and make changes of course, if they want to make changes. You know, so at least if they understand what some of those associations behind money then they might understand maybe why they didn’t take a particular action, or maybe why they were so much more likely to take action, because maybe those positive associations; it’s always something of freedom. It’s always something that helped them accomplish something, rather than it’s always been a wall, a barrier, something holding them back. So, we all have our own associations, our own feelings around money. So, we come to the table, bringing with all of that in the back of our mind and our clients, the people we serve, they all have their own association. And so, we’re trying to be what I think is one of the best qualities of the Your Money Your Goals resources, is trying to be a very independent and nonjudgmental as possible, as trying to move that aspect. We’re trying to give these people we serve, the tools and the resources to make the best decisions for themselves rather than what we think is the best thing for them. So, that’s again, I think that’s a really positive space on this one. We’re trying to give them the tools to make the best decisions for themselves, and empower them to continue to make more choices. So, what we’re going to get through today - obviously, a brief introduction to the CFPB. Heather already alluded to, you know, touched on that a little bit, but a couple of more slides, just to make sure everyone’s really good and aware of what the CFPB is doing for all of us. Also then, jumping into the main part, the Your Money Your Goals toolkit. Today we’re going to go through half of the Your Money Your Goals toolkit and then the next trend gets into the other half of it. But then we’re also in the - the follow up, the next - number three and four. We’re going to get into the booklets, the Your Money Your Goals booklets. And then the focus guides, all of which can be helpful in using these tools with your clients. You have lots of options - finding the best tool for the right situation; using your expertise to then be able to apply that right intervention with that client, to help them help themselves. And of course, again, we’ll talk through not just how those tools can be used for, but also the strategies for using those tools. So again, a brief introduction to the CFPB. You know, really when it comes to the CFPB what we’re looking at here is they’re working to insure that the consumers - us and our clients, we’re going to get the information that we need, to make the financial decisions that we believe are the best ones for ourselves and for our families. So, our clients, they’re going to be able to make the best decision for themselves and their families. That the prices are upfront, the risks are visible and that nothing is buried in the fine print. So, another aspect in the Office of Community Affairs. They’re the one that have been tasked with creating and updating these and keeping them always again, up to date. They’re part of the Bureau’s Division of Consumer Education and engagement. The big part of their - their main focus here is they work with a lot of varieties of populations. Once - their focus is really primarily those who lack full affordable access to financial services, which is primarily our low to moderate income households - low wealth, people who are in other ways, financially excluded or vulnerable. So again, those are the main targets, but all of this stuff can apply to everyone. We all benefit from being able to manage our finances better. So, I’ll use the term financial empowerment often. That is the term that we use when it comes to the Your Money Your Goals toolkit. And we’re probably all very familiar with the term financial literacy or financial capacity or all of those other terms. But what we’re looking at; what is financial empowerment, is that we’re taking that financial literacy. We’re teaching them topics. You know, this might be, you know, I’m going to teach a class on credit. Okay? That’s it. I teach a class on credit; they leave and that’s it; that’s financial literacy. I’m teaching them that aspect. But what we’re trying to do with financial empowerment is we’re giving them the skills and confidence to use that knowledge, and that’s financial empowerment. So how that relates to the Your Money Your Goals toolkit is it’s the action step. I’ve taught financial literacy classes for I think six years now, and this is always something that I felt is such a very helpful addition. It’s not just all right, I might teach a class on credit and teach them all about how credit scores, credit reports work, all of that fun stuff. But then at the end of the day, you give them handouts; give them something that they can take action on. They take home and then they go home and they pull their credit report; they review their credit report; they make sure it’s accurate. Maybe start taking steps to improve their credit report and scores. These are those - and once they’ve taken a couple of those steps, they’re going to become empowered because they’ve seen - they’ve felt that confidence, that swell of confidence that happens when they’ve taken these steps to better themselves, better their family, make life a little bit better when it comes to their financial situation. So, that’s empowering and that makes them want to do more. Of course, while we’re trying to get this information out to all of you, is the access. When you’re already out there, you’re in the field holding these workshops, teaching financial literacy, empowering your clients to take those financial steps, you have access and they trust you. They’re coming to you. So you have those opportunities to provide financial empowerment, so that’s why we really want to push to get Your Money Your Goals out to all of you and hopefully, you know, if I do my job well, you’ll feel really comfortable by the end of these webinars on how to use these tools, how they can help you, how they can maybe enhance what you’re already doing, or just give you another option, to maybe just, you know, break through to a particular client that might be just sticking on a step. So, that’s a little bit of background. Now I’m going to start showing you what’s all in there. First, I’ll give you an overview of what’s all in the toolkit, all the resources. And then I’m going to start digging into some of the tools, so you have a feel for really what’s all in there. So, as I mentioned, today what we’re going to be getting through, is half of the Your Money Your Goals toolkit. This covers so many topics, so we wanted to spread it out so that way it wasn’t too overwhelming in one, or just so much information in one fell swoop. But then we also, you know, in the third session, we’re going to get into the focus guides. So, if you work with Native communities, people with disabilities, or the reentry population, people coming back from incarceration, that these focus guides can help you add context. And actually, some custom and some modified tools from Your Money Your Goals to help you have a better conversation with those particular populations using Your Money Your Goals. So, it frames the conversations, it gives you some tools that obviously with working with those particular populations, would be extremely effective, but with the general population, it might be a little too tailored and unnecessary. And so that’s something you definitely - I hope you join us for that third part if you work with any of those populations. We’ll highlight those resources as well. And then in the fourth session we’re going to get into the booklet. So, right now there are four booklets, technically three, but one of them, Behind on Bills is in English and Spanish right now. The CFPB is working on getting the rest of the resources in Spanish as well. And when they’re available, if you’re on the Your Money Your Goals email list, you will be notified and you’ll be able to go in and download free copies - download the electronic version of these tools and order free copies to be sent to you, and so that way you can use them in your client interactions. So, that’s what’s all in there. That’s the full suite. If you think about all of the products - the booklets are modified versions tools from the Your Money Your Goals toolkit, modified in a way, around that topic. So, those are - we’ll be getting much more into those in that fourth session. But then again, if you start to think of it, as we go through the tools over those next two sessions, you’re going to get a good feel of like what the context is for how those booklets are then put together. So, the tools - yes, thank you very much Heather. I appreciate the comment. Yes, these booklets are free, along with actually all of the focus guides and the Your Money Your Goals toolkits as well. Feel free to go on the CFPB’s Web site, go ahead and download those free versions, so you have the electronic version on there. But you also can order the free physical copies, so they can be sent to you and you can have a copy for yourself. And actually if you even pass this onto any of your colleagues, feel free. Order copies for them as well, so that way you have access to them. But now within the topics, here’s what’s in the toolkit. Here are the topics that we’ve got. So, there’s an introductory section that gives you some background information, helps - if this is - if financial empowerment is new to you; financial conversations in general, are new to you, this can give you a little bit of context on how to these conversations, ways to get started, ways to even just get used to listening for some of those cues that can help you then respond with the right tool. So, if you’re having a conversation with somebody about maybe just they’re coming to you for getting financial aid for some reason, and during that they mention that they - something they just kind of let slip or mention that they’re having issues paying particular bills. Well at that point if you become comfortable with these tools, you’d be ready to be able to go right into the toolkit, find those couple of tools that you think would be the right ones to just print out, let them work through those tools. If you have even a moment with that client, you could print them out and they’re so self-explanatory. There’s even a front page that explains how to us the tool. You could just hand it to them. Give them a little background and explain to them why you’re handing them this tool, and what it can do for them. But then they can take that. Or if you have the time, if you have time for like one on one, or even if you’re in like full workshops with lots of clients, this can be something that they can then work through themselves with a little guidance from you, or with a lot, depending on how much you have time to do. So again, this introductory section is going to help frame that up. Then we get into the goal settings, savings, income - Module 4 is all about spending. Then we get into the cash flow with Module 5. It brings the income and the spending together. And so it looks - looking at the timing of how the income and the spending work together and to see does it all work out? Then we get into debt, then credit, choosing financial products. And then consumer protection, with Module 9. So that’s what’s all in the toolkit. And now we’re going to go in and I want to show you a little bit about the format of them. So, these tools - within the modules, the modules are really for you. The module itself. It’s a lot of context. It gives you information about these topics. So, if this is new to you, this can be helpful. Or even though you might talk about these topics all the time, but it never hurts to just get a fresh way of talking about a subject, or maybe just a nice refresher about - or a new approach, about how you could talk about a subject with somebody. So, the module itself, there’s the content at the beginning, a narrative section or whatever you what to call it. And that’s at the beginning. That’s for you, to help give you that context for having these conversations. And so it’s going to tell you at the beginning here, what are the tools that are in the section; what are they going to help you do? And then there’s the tools and the handouts. And that’s the part you would use with the clients, with the individuals. So, that was something you would print out. The only difference between the tool and the handout, is that the tool has some sort - something you could fill in, in that tool. So, there’s something you might be able to write in or check off or something like that. Whereas the handout, it’s informational. That’s all it’s for. It’s just give someone - you can read through it; it gives you some reflection on whatever the topic is. So, the other thing it can give you is a little bit within this - the narrative section, there’s also some sections - again, if this is new to you; maybe this I something your agency is now just looking at using for the first time. It gives you some ideas about well, what if you only have ten minutes with an individual; what could you do? Or if you have 30 minutes or if you have multiple sessions, what could you do; how - and these are just suggestions. So, you could use it however you think is most appropriate. I’m sure all of you operate differently. You have your own different interactions with clients. So, find whatever works best for you, but if you need some ideas, again this is - it’s going to give you some ideas. So, like if you’re ten minutes, if you’re looking in the goal setting module, you could use the Setting SMART goals tool, to help that individual identify goals that are going to help them plan for and attain the things that matter most to them. If you have 30 minutes maybe go through that Setting SMART goals tool, as well as putting goals into action. Those are two separate tools that work really, really well together. But again, if you have only 30 seconds; let’s say if you only have 30 seconds with this client and you still know that they’re having some issues, these tools again, are so self-explanatory. You could just print it out and your ability to hear for those cues, will let you know when is the right time to use a tool. But then you could just print that out and hand it to them and they could take that home and work through it themselves. And that’s going to be a great way to get started. And maybe if they come back you could even follow up on them, but either way they’re going to get that intervention, they’re going to get that opportunity for taking steps. So, again, I mentioned that there is information right before each tool that gives a - that individual, some information about that tool. So, if you just had an opportunity to hand it to them that’s still going to be a big step, because it tells them exactly how to use the tools. One thing I’ll also mention, since it’s kind of mentioning this on this slide, is that if you have a chance, go to the CFPB’s Web site, go to the Your Money Your Goals section and look at the tools. If you go into the Your Money Your Goals toolkit section, you can download each individual tool. You don’t even have to treat the toolkit as a bit toolkit, all as one piece. You could actually go in and select individual tools from this. And all of the ones on the CFPB’s Web site now in a new update that just came out; they’re all fillable and they auto calculate. So, if you’re working with somebody with like let’s say a spending a tracker, you could start typing in the numbers into this PDF and it’s going to start doing the math for you. I know how much we all love to do math; it’s so much fun, so I don’t want to take that away from you. So, you could still use the paper copies, but if you’d like to have it do the math for you, then take advantage of that. It’s a great other option. You can use it either way. Whatever makes the most sense for you. So, you can see this is - once you have a chance to check it out, you’re going to see there are a ton of tools within each module, somewhere between well I guess 2 to 8. I think eight is the most now we have in a particular module; eight tools in a module. But yes, you can see they’re all named very easy to understand. You know exactly what kind of a tool you’re going to get by looking at it. So, if you see all right, we have a tool called saving in asset limits, we understand is that if you have somebody who is wanting to save in their own financial systems, we need to understand the asset limits that they might be facing. Or if you have somebody who wants to track their spending, guess what; we go into the spending tracker. We’re trying to make it really straightforward so that way you could easily find your way around these tools, to be able to provide that right intervention. So again, here is a nice visual aid, to see all of the different tools that are in each section. Oh, I guess seven. I’m sorry. Seven is the most tools in one module, so, there we go. Okay. Now I’m going to start showing you some of the tools. First, I’m going to get into the starting the money conversation. This is in the introduction section. So, in there there’s a tool. Now this one we’re not going to go through. I don’t have a screen shot of this one, but I want you to reflect on this one. And if you have an opportunity, go back and check this out yourself. Bring up the tool. This financial empowerment self-assessment is for staff. This is for the service provider to test you; to see where you’re at in terms of your knowledge about topics as well as maybe even comfort level around topics. And so this can be a great way to just see maybe there are some opportunities to learn more about a particular topic. You know, maybe you’re like well, I wish I knew more about it, based on this quiz. So, you know, maybe I’m going to research that a little bit more. It’s great. But, you know, it’s always kind of nice to have an excuse to learn more about a topic. But the other thing you might find is that you knew more about a topic than you thought you did, and that can be pretty empowering. That can be another great reason for just now you’re more comfortable talking about a particular topic. So, I recommend everybody take a chance to check out this particular tool; test yourselves and see where you’re at. It’s a great way. And then there’s of course an answer key right afterwards, so no cheating. But go from - go afterwards, and check your answers; see where they’re at and they’ll tell you where to find out more information. But the reason why I have this situation assessment is really important, whether it’s, you know, testing ourselves like the last tool, but otherwise looking at the clients, I’m trying to find out if you’re having conversations, when they first come to you and you have the at opportunity to find out where they’re at, where are we starting from, if I’m going to give them some tools to help them get to where they want to be, where are they starting? I need to know that starting point and that can help us. So that’s where the My Money Picture - in the introductory section, there’s the quiz for you and there’s basically the quiz for them and the My Money Picture is the one for the clients. So, you see on the left side, is the actual tool itself. You could print out companies of this. So, if you have opportunities for assessment for your clients, like maybe there’s the intake portion of your case management; go ahead and print out copies of those and you can hand those out. Let them walk through it. And then there’s an answer key right afterwards. So, until you feel more comfortable with exactly how to navigate the toolkit, feel free to refer to that and that’s going to help you make sure that you’re helping continue the conversation. So, if you have an individual on let’s say question 4 - so when unexpected expenses or emergencies happen, do you have some money set aside to cover them? So, if they said no, well then maybe we need to have a conversation with them about savings or even paying bills, so you can see how the answer key on the right side helps you understand like, where can I take them to? So, a nice way to get started again getting the conversation started with them around money. So, that’s the introductory section. Now we’re going to get into Module 1, all about setting goals. So, I love this section; I think it’s great. When I see goals I always think of this as the motivation. When you’re going to be working with somebody to try to help - they’re going to be taking lots of steps; this is going to be hard. It’s - if budgeting; pulling your credit reports; disputing errors; all of this stuff. If it was completely easy like just oh, I just press one button and then boom, it’s all done; well then we wouldn’t have to have this conversation. There would be not - it wouldn’t be a painful conversation for everybody. Well this takes some work. So, I think of the - when it comes to goal setting, this is the motivation. This is the thing that we all reflect back to, when we’re having to put in that extra time to really get that effective, you know, to track our spending, track our income, make those hard choices about how we’re going to spend our money better. Really take the time to make sure that I’m doing what’s in my best interest for that goal. And goal is what I’m going to come back to. And that’s what I’m going to reflect on as I go forward. So, having a really good detailed smart goal is going to really be helpful for keeping me on task. So, SMART goals is a fun acronym. I’m sure most of you are very familiar with it. But for those of you that aren’t, it’s just an acronym for Specific Measurable Achievable Relevant and Timebound. So, you know, if we’re just going to set a goal, if we want to keep it really nice and big, so, you know, maybe these - we think of it as hopes, wants and dreams. So if we have oh, I’d like to buy a new television, well if you’ve ever been to any electronic - a store that sells electronics, you know that there’s a wide variety of televisions. There’s, you know, ones from very inexpensive to scares me to think of buying something expensive. So, when we really are setting a goal, if you want to use that as - if we want to set a goal for buying a television, we can’t just leave it as simple as I’d like to buy a new television. How do we know how much to save up for; how do we know if it’s achievable? Well we need to make that a very strong goal, so we’re actually going to use that acronym to go through and make it Specific Measurable Achievable Relevant and Timebound. We’re adding all of these aspects to take it from that hopes, wants, dreams and make it a goal of saving $400 for a new television within six months. And now I know how to - now I know what actions I need to take, to see if I can achieve that. So, that’s why I like this tool. And within the new update it got even better. So, for those of you who have actually seen, you know, maybe the version that was released before January of this year, it was good; it was great, but it’s even better now. They’ve added some aspects of really looking at your values before we’re setting goals, to make sure that it’s really something that matters to us. So, when we’re looking back at that thing is it relevant; does it really matter to me; that’s what it’s going to help you do. What are my priorities? So, it’s going to first identify the values that guide you. What is it that just turns my crank? You know, it gets me up in the morning. Okay? And then using that we’re going to brainstorm a list of hopes, wants, dreams that can - that fit with that. And then use that guide to create that into a SMART goal and really go through those steps. Make sure it’s specific. Make sure it actually has a monetary value attached to it, so it’s measurable. Make sure we have at timeframe attachment. When do you want to have it achieved by, so we know exactly how much time we have and then we can break down exactly how much we need to save either per month or per week or biweekly or whatever is the timeframe that works for us? So, that’s the setting SMART goals tool. It’s really, really effective. Again, it’s also fillable on the CFPB’s Web site. So, feel free to go there. And then you actually can just type in the amount. And then if you finish with the client you can just get prints. Print two copies - one for your client file, one for the client themselves, and they have that to take home and it’s nobody’s handwriting had to be involved with the process. So, now let’s say they’ve created that SMART goal. How do we make it achievable? How do we actually make it happen? So, we know we want to save $400 for the new television within six months. So, how do we make that actionable? So, that’s what this next tool is going to help us do, is we’re going to take that full SMART goal; we’re going to have it broken down into multiple steps. So, just making sure - like what is one specific step in each box? So, you’d put that down, 1-4 or how many you need, to achieve the goal. Or what are some of the resources I’m going to need to make that happen? When do I want to have each of those steps completed by? I want to make sure that I’m still working towards something, always on task, so I don’t fall back and be like oh, I’m tired today; I’m just going to put it off until tomorrow. Let’s get it done now. The faster we get done with that goal, the faster we can reach another goal and another goal. So, that’s what this is going to help us do, but sometimes it’s just nice to be able to write it out. What are those specific steps that I need to get to this tool that’s fillable on the Web site, or you can fill it out by hand, but then you’ve got that action step. You know exactly and then you cross them off once they’re done. And the last tool in this section, is the handout that I wanted to mention, which is revising goals. This is a new resource that was added to this latest update. But this is about revising our goals to make sure that we’re always working towards what is in our best interest. Because sometimes our circumstances change. Maybe we lose our job or, you know, maybe we got a great tax return or something, and now we change, you know, we don’t need to be saving for the same thing because maybe we’re able to purchase it early. You know, what are these things that come up or maybe you moved, so maybe you were saving up for a car because you wanted to be able to get to work more reliably. So, now you’ve moved into another place that’s right on a nice bus line or track systems or something like that.…or maybe even close enough where you can just walk. And so, you don’t need that as much. So, anytime these things change, we need to make sure that we change our goals as well, to make sure we’re doing what’s in our best interest at all times. So, this handout is not something where there’s something you fill out, but it’s something that when we’re setting our goals we can reflect on. So, that was Module 1, so all about goal setting. And now we go from Module 1 into Module 2 for savings. Now, when I say going from one to another, keep in mind this is not a curriculum. This is not something that needs to be done in any particular order. These are numbered just so it’s easier for us to find. But you know - use your expertise to know when’s the right time to use the right tool. So again, maybe we start off because they’re having issues with debt. Before we even talk about setting goals; looking at any of their other resources, we need to take control and find out where their debt situation is at. So, we go over to Module 6. That’s the debt section. You know when is the right time. But in this case I’m just going to go through them in this particular number order just because well, that’s how they are in my slide deck, so we’re going to go with that. So, Module 2, for savings. So, let’s use that chat box again. Again, chat box please so I can make sure that I see them. What are some examples of unexpected expenses or emergencies - things maybe you’ve faced or even just clients or people that you’ve worked with, or even just things you’ve heard of before? What are some examples of unexpected expenses or emergencies? You get furloughed from work; car repairs. Excellent. Yes, your car breaking down; death in the family; travel; pet bills. Wow. Nice reply. You guys are moving fast today. So, you can think of - yes, all of these things - appliance replacement. Oh, my goodness, yes. Illnesses. You mean you don’t prepare to get sick all the time? No, I’m just kidding. But this is perfect. Death of a loved one. Yes, these things come up all the time. Sadly. You know, obviously we hope that death of a loved one comes up very, very, very rarely. But all of these things we need to be prepared for in some way. It might not be that we can completely prepare for those. You know, they always say you need to have three to six months of your expenses saved up. And that’s exactly everyone should have in an emergency savings account. And that’s great. And we all should still keep that bar set right there, because that is really what’s going to give us that security through the unknown. Being prepared completely for these things that are going to come up. But if we’re working with clients that zero savings, barely able to make ends meet, that’s going to be - that maybe is a little bit of a big goal for right now. So, let’s focus on something that’s more in the short to medium term - middle term, is that we’re looking at something that’s achievable at this point. So, I actually really like having that conversation with clients. You’re sitting down; have them create a list over the last five years, what are some things that they’ve faced; some emergencies? Even if it’s just your kid coming up to you and saying oh, I’m taking a field trip and I need X amount, or I - there’s a sport I’m taking up and I need this much money for this. All of these different things from small to large, all of these different expenses that can come up that we aren’t prepared for. So, if we could maybe create a little savings account and maybe continue to build that - what could be done if we had even $500? How many of those ones that you listed off could be accomplished - could be covered with even having $500? So again, we’re not trying to drop the bar. What we’re saying is that’s going to be our real long term goal, but in the short term let’s focus on something that they can really get to and creating that savings account. And then I like using that list that they created, to, you know, put it in number order, smallest to largest. And then as they start saving, you can start crossing off all of those expenses that they face and say now you’re protected against that. If that comes up, you’re ready to handle that….and then you keep going down the list. As they continue to build on it - you go maybe from $500; maybe they go up to $1000. And they keep building. So, that’s why I think savings - having a conversation that can be more real to them, helps. I think it’s a much more, you know, a much better approach to try to break through that well, you know, using a credit card or, you know, alternative lending sources for covering these unexpected bills. So, let’s do this in a much more efficient manner. So, the first tool in this module, is of course, a savings plan. So, that’s what we’re looking at. First, we’re going to take - what’s our reason? What’s our reason for savings? So, this could be, you know, another way to approach how we create our goal or we work towards that SMART goal that we just created. But this also could be just we want to create maybe that emergency savings account. Highlight that example. So it’s actually in the example that’s on your screen. So, you see - let’s say we want to accomplish getting to $1000 for emergency savings fund and we want to accomplish it within ten months because it makes your math real easy on the screen right now, but that amount could be anything. So in this case, this - the total amount needed is $1000. So weeks to reach your goal is 40, so we just - it does the math for us. If you’re on the fillable PDF boom, it does the math for you. It makes it nice and easy. So we know we have to save $25.00 each week. The reason why we break it down weekly is for a lot of our clients that appeals to them better, because now we can make - not only is it just, you know, we make that smaller savings amount and it just feels a little bit more piecemeal, but the other reason why it can be really beneficial to see it as smaller, that weekly goal, is that then some of the choices that we make, those smaller things like going to convenience stores and grabbing a soda, going out to eat and grabbing - instead of making dinner at home or grabbing coffee, these things that we do, that nickel and dime ourselves out of our budget, can make a much bigger difference. That’s how we can make these goals happen. So, that’s where then the next step is right below is those strategies for savings. So, what steps will I take to make that a reality? So, maybe I reduced my cable bill or my cell phone package. Maybe that’s going to save me some money. Maybe if I cut down on my eating out or maybe my getting coffee budget, you know, whatever it is that we have, that thing that’s not a necessity that we can cut back on. So, I really like it. So, I’ve got a comment, so it’s all about making the stuff realistic versus ideal. So, I like that. Thank you very much for the comment. That really we’re trying to make this something that looks real to them, that is real to them because then they understand how they’re going to do it. And that’s why we’re taking these - we’re even breaking it down to those individual action steps. What real action step can you do? What can you take to make it happen? And so then hey, we’ve got our list there. We’re going to do those things that we’ve listed in the sheet. And, you know, if we do those, we’re going to be able to hit our savings goal and we’re going to accomplish it. And how great is that going to feel when we actually make that a reality? So, yes, that’s why I like the tool. I think this is so core to people really setting themselves up for success. I hinted on one of the tools earlier, is this - the savings and asset limits. The reason why I think this is so important to include, is if you’ve got any - if you’re working with clients that are receiving financial assistance, in different places, there are assets limits on them, to actually continue to receive these benefits. So, we need to be very careful about that, is that we’re being cautious about that. And so, in the case - we don’t want an individual as they start saving up is that all of a sudden, they get bumped off of their benefits, that maybe that’s how they’re actually even able to, you know, make it through the month. So, just understanding what the limit is on all of these different benefits in your specific region, is going to help have the conversation with an individual that maybe right up to this point, any time you bring up savings to them it’s like nope, I’m not going to save because I could lose my benefits, and so I don’t want to save at all. But oh, so I’m sorry, I just got a question here. Are these tools in the toolkit prior to January 2019? Most of the tools I’ve shown, the only one that was not in the previous version of the toolkit; the only one that wasn’t in there was the revising goals handout. All of the rest of these tools were in the previous version, but they’ve all been updated. They’re a little bit more streamlined, a little bit more concise. Most of them fit now in two pages, whereas maybe they fit in three or four pages beforehand. So, really, really great tools. They did a great job in formatting them to be a little bit more approachable. But again, I’m sorry to kind of get distracted on the asset limits. But if you’re having difficulties speaking with clients because they’re on financial assistance, that they don’t’ want to save at all because they’re receiving this assistance because of that asset limit, if we could write down for them here are all the benefits you receive and say here are the asset limits for all of them; let’s say the minimum one, the smallest one was $2500, well then now we at least can have an open conversation. It’s always up to them whether or not they want to save. We’re not telling them they need to save, but now at least they can make that choice to say you could save up to this amount without losing your benefits. So maybe that would open them up to saying maybe it’s halfway - maybe I’ll feel comfortable going halfway and save up to $1000. That could be very liberating. So, again, hopefully that helps you with the conversation you might want to have. So, I actually I really like this one, when I’m talking to peoples about - there’s - the next tool is finding a place for savings is sometimes it’s actually a conversation, like where do you want to save your money? And there are lots of different options. So, I’m sure if you just thought out right now, what are the different places where you could save money, whether that’s in a savings or a checking account or maybe an investment option like a CD or something like that. But there are lots of other options like hiding it in your house somewhere, like under the mattress or burying it in the backyard or something. There are tons of different places you could save money. But we want to have a real straightforward option. We’re not saying which one is the best - which one is the right one, because all of them have upsides and downsides. There are some risks and benefits to each of them. So this is another sheet that gets back to that point I made earlier about we’re not trying to tell them what to do. We’re giving clients the options, the ability to just choose apples to apples comparison, and find what is the best option for themselves and their family. Not what we want for them, but what they want for themselves. And just compare, use, you know, look through what the benefits, what the risks for these different situations, and make the best decisions for themselves. So this is what the tool looks like. You’ve got an option in there, so, you know, again saving money at a bank or credit union; there’s - the benefit is that the money is protected and it’s insured. So, that’s really great. You know that money is safe there. The risk though is that you might, if you don’t use the account properly, you might get charged a fee. And it might also, if - and you might not have complete access to that account. You know, it might be let’s say Sunday night at 9:00 pm, you might not be able to pull that money out. I guess with ATMs it’s probably not that big of a concern, but yes, so there’s different things that this could be affected. But then there’s also in saving money with a friend or family member; just like leaving it with them. Well there’s no cost to maintain it, but it might not be quite as safe and definitely not insured. So again, we’re just trying to let them have the options and compare for themselves and decide for themselves. So, now it’s Module 3, tracking income and benefits. So that was all Module 2, all about savings. Now we’re looking at Module 3, tracking income and benefits. This - the primary tool; in here, as I’m sure you are not surprised by it, is we’re all about tracking your income. And so that’s really the one I want to highlight today. As you’ll notice, I’m kind of jumping around. I’m not covering every single tool in every module. At this point we just don’t have enough time, so I hope you get so inspired by the presentation that you go and check out the tools for yourself - see how they look, see how they function. Especially check out the whole fillable aspect that’s - it’s a really neat feature that’s been added. But here is in the income and benefits. We really want to make sure and that’s I think the strength of these tools is it’s reminding us, its’ not that we’re just tracking what is our primary source of income. So, maybe what’s our 9 to 5 job? Any irregular income we might receive; maybe do a little bit of work on the side and we just get paid cash and that’s it. We just, you know, maybe work on our friends computers; fix friends’ computers for a little extra cash. Again, whatever it is, money is money. We need to include all of it. We also need to include things like benefits as well because that’s going to help our clients make the transition off the benefits. In the case, you know, the ones that are going to be - that are limited by time or maybe as they start to make more money, eventually they might lose their benefits and we want to help them prepare for that. And that’s by being able to see the effect, like actually have the benefit included in the budget is going to help us really see again, what all is coming in. So, here is the income tracker. It’s a really straightforward document. We’ve got, you know, line for Job 1, 2, any child support, disability benefits, SNAP benefits, (TANIF) or any other government programs and then other, so you can fill in whatever you want. But where I think another strength of this is at this point we’re going to look through - you’ve got the breakdown week 1 through 5. So, we’re looking at the timing as well. Again, not just saying how much do I have coming in during the month, but also this breaks down to, you know, not just how much during the month, but even week to week, so that helps us really line that up. So, great, well I just have a couple more - I know we’re getting close to our time here. I have just a couple of more slides I want to show you, but then at that point then we’ll take questions on anything that you all have. So, feel free to start thinking about any questions you might have. So, Module 4 - Module 4 is now getting into the spending side. So, this is the last module we’re going to cover for today; all about spending. So, this is getting us really into making sure that we’re identifying exactly how we’re spending all of our money. We’re not saying like how - we’re not making any judgments for the clients. We want them to fill this out absolutely accurately, because that’s when it makes it more effective. But when we make choices, if I know I spend exactly $41.53 every month on coffee, well that being something I can cut on my spending. If I was to cut that down, I would know exactly how much money I would be saving. Whereas like well I don’t’ know it’s somewhere around, you know, we allays underestimate. So, I would say it’s always around - it’s somewhere around $25.00. Well if that’s the case, making the changes we really don’t have any idea of exactly how much we’re going to save. So, yes, now kind of looking at that income tracker here is the other side of the equation, the spending tracker. You can see again, we’ve got the week by week breakdown, category totals on the right side, and then also the total there at the bottom. So that way we’re going to really see exactly how it all breaks down. So again, I love those two tools in cooperation with each other. They’re great to be used together. Then there’s a bill calendar. Just the big thing about this is if you have a problem paying your bills on time, putting them down on paper, writing them down on your bill calendar, can be a really big help. Somebody just - that’s the biggest difference to just making sure we’re paying our bills on time. Now the last tool I wanted to mention before we start taking questions here, is basically if you think about - so looking at these questions here, what happens if you pay your rent late? Well if you pay your rent late you probably get hit with a little bit of a fee. But if you miss multiple rent payments, you’re probably going to bet evicted. If you miss a car payment, it’s just a couple of days late, you get hit with a fee again. But if you miss multiple car payments you get your car repossessed. So these are - like if you think about the consequences of skipping different types of bills, they all have different consequences and we need to take that into consideration when we’re prioritizing bills. So, the next tool here again, is the last one I want to show is that prioritizing bills. Sometimes our clients are prioritizing the wrong bills first. Maybe they have a particular collection agent that’s calling them all the time and so they pay that bill first even though that’s so much lower on the priority list than it really should be. You know, we want to make sure we’re paying our rent first and any car payments we’ve got, insurance, you know, those things that we absolutely need. And so this tool can help us make sure we’re prioritizing our bills for the best because if we have only enough money for seven to ten bills, which seven should we pay first? It doesn’t mean we should just skip the other ones because we just don’t have the money for it, but maybe we just make sure those are covered first, and then we contact creditors on the other ones, to try to create a plan. So, that’s really - those are the tools that I wanted to highlight. I hope we have a good cross section of the tools that are all in there. So now, at this point, I’d like to open it up to questions. So, Operator, if you wouldn’t mind opening it up for questions, I’m done with my presentation. Coordinator: We will now being our question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question, please press star 1 from your phone and unmute your line. Please speak your name clearly when prompted, to be placed into the queue. If you would like to withdraw your question, please press star 2. Again, if you would like to ask a question, please press star 1. One moment as we wait for any questions. Heather Brown: While we’re waiting for questions, I just want to thank you Scott. That was a fabulous presentation. It was very interesting and you have a lot of positive energy behind this and you gave some very practical skills and ways to use that toolkit. So we’re really looking forward to the remaining three sessions. If anyone has questions, please don’t be shy. There’s no question that’s too small and no question that’s too big. If we can’t answer it we’ll research it and get back to you. So, this is a great time to get some information on how to use these great tools. And I am going to send a copy of these slides to everyone, but please know that you can also go download the, you know, the entire slide deck from the Web site, Your Money Your Goals. So, that’s something that you - everybody that is participating in this probably will want to do eventually. Operator, did you get any calls yet? Coordinator: There are currently no questions in queue. Heather Brown: Okay. Scott Bennett: Okay. It looks like we did get one in the chat box, so that’s great. So the question here is from (Cara). It says where can we find the sheet that tells us what we can talk about if we have 30 minutes, 10 minutes, etc., with clients? And so in each of the modules, so if you go into let’s say Module 1, you’re going to see that in the narrative section in the beginning. So, before we get to the tools section, it’s going to be in that beginning section of each individual module. So, if you wanted to look into what conversations could you talk about if you had 10 minutes or 30 minutes with a client on income, well you could go into the income section in Module 3 and then look at that section and get some ideas from there. [Brief silence} Heather Brown: Great. Operator, did any calls come in, in the meantime - any questions? I’m sorry. Coordinator: There are currently no questions in queue. Heather Brown: Okay. Well I think Scott, you did such a fantastic job; you covered everything and everybody got what they needed out of this session. So, we’ll look forward to everybody that’s on please come back for the second session, which will be next Tuesday, 2:00 to 3:00 pm Eastern time. And the log in is in the newsletter that hopefully everybody got yesterday. The phone number - the dial in is the same, but the login is a little different. So, I just want to make sure everybody is aware of that. For the three sessions the login changes. Okay. And of course, if you need anything else or any questions or comments about anything, feel free to email the CFPB_FINEX@CFPB.gov box and I will respond to you. Okay. Well we’re looking forward to having you back next week Scott. And I’m going to even go in and look at some of the tools that - some of the suggestions that you gave and just use them myself, so that I can become more familiar with them. And hopefully the others will do that as well. Thank you again, and we look forward to having you back. Operator, this is going to conclude our call. Coordinator: Thank you for your participation in today’s conference. You may disconnect at this time. END NWX-CFPB HQ (US) Moderator: Heather Brown 04-02-19/1:00 pm Confirmation # 8933366 Page 1