Working in finance often means advising other people on how
to handle their money. It's a different story when
it's your own finances. And my guest learned this
the hard way, Lisa Fisher is a chief Growth
and lending officer at Mission Lane, a fintech company
that serves underbanked customers. Lisa, thank you for
joining us. Can you share with us your big
money? Mistake? My big money mistake was I
allowed someone else to control my finances without asking any
questions. There was massive credit card debt home had
been foreclosed upon. What was the total damage?
$800,000? Now that's inclusive of tax and, and
the a home that was foreclosed on, but it
was$800,000 in total. How long did it take
for you to get back to zero to wiping everything
out? 10 years till I was to zero,
paid everything back, felt like I could start saving
. But I remember when I felt like I really
made it back was the first time I could give
to charity and that was about 12 years. How
did you go about rebuilding your finances? I started
maintaining a spreadsheet and I just kept track of everything
. Here's what I've got to pay down. Here's
how I'm gonna, here's what I need to save
to get there. How does this fold into what
you do now? Because you built your career in
financial services working for credit card companies. You work
in fintech now, but there's a different kind of
audience that you're working for. We offer financial products
to the subprime customer, whether it's providing access,
showing them progress, providing them a great experience.
We try and make sure that they can move along
in their financial journeys because they all start from various
points. We serve me. I am a subprime
customer. And so I feel so lucky that I
get to work at Mission Lane and hear stories and
talk to customers and be able to help move them
on their financial journey. So if someone were to
come to you at Mission Lane with a similar story
of what you had experienced, how would you advise
them the biggest advice of, you know, where
you're at? Often? We go, well,
I'm just not gonna worry about that and we'll figure
that one out later. Get your foundation know where
all of your money is going, know where all
of your debt is, know where you're at and
then create a plan. There is no plan unless
you know where you're at. If a young engaged
couple were to come to you and ask you for
your advice, what would you tell them, I
tell them both to be transparent. There's no reason
not to be transparent. You're building a life together
, you separate chore, but you don't separate trust
. And so I would tell them to be transparent
. Share, make sure your partner knows what's going
on and understands it because that's what real trust is
. We often think trust is blind. It's actually
OK to say, can you explain this to me
? Can you show me something underneath it? It
doesn't have to be blind. And we talk a
lot about, you know, you don't have to
have blind faith and if somebody does just doesn't want
to tell you something, there's something in that,
there's information in that.