From Survival Mode to Wealth and Freedom With Jessica Stroud

This is Wake Up to Wealth, a podcast dedicated to helping you change the way you think about wealth. And now, here's your host, Brandon Brittingham. Hey, what's up, everybody? We are back with another episode of Wake Up to Wealth. And I know I start every show by saying the same thing, but hey, look, this is the reality of what it is. Thank you guys so much. We are at about 3.7 million downloads. Our last episode is trending over 120,000 downloads, making us consistently one of the top podcasts on investing in the United States. And it is so cool that you guys have continued to support this show and make it so big because it gives me the ability to not sell out to corporate sponsors or anything I don't want to do and get really cool people on like my cool friends, like one of my cool friends who's on today. So I can't thank you guys enough. Thank you so much. I never in a million years would have imagined this show would have gotten as big as it did. So again, thank everyone for the support. And today, I'm super excited because I've got one of my favorite people in the world on the podcast with me today. This is an awesome human being, extremely sharp business person, investor, you know, a lot of things, mom, super cool person. And it's Jessica Straut. Thank you for coming on with us today. Oh, absolutely. When I refer, when I talk about you, I refer to Pete, I refer to you as, oh, it's Brandon, my money guy, one of my money guys. It's like, we have so much more outside of our friendship than that, but it's, we always just bring it back to money. And it's, it's, there are always amazing conversations. No, I appreciate that. One of the things I think, you know, is super cool about you is when I first met you, you know, one of the things you talked about a lot was how you built, you know, kind of a large, you know, business offer for. But before we even get into that, if you wouldn't mind, just let the people know, like what you do, kind of what you are as an entrepreneur. Just give them a little bit of background on you. Absolutely. Well, first and foremost, I am a mother and a champion of women. It's in my DNA. I, I wake up every day and just think, how can I champion women to believe in themselves and accomplish their dreams? So that, that's just the vibe I walk around with and who I am at the core. But the actual product, I guess, that I sell is I own an insurance brokerage in Kansas State. It's an independent insurance brokerage. I've had that since about 2012. And, you know, it's nothing, nothing super fancy, nothing super serious, just your regular auto and home and small commercial insurance. It's, it's actually a little boring and steady. And I really appreciate and like that part of it because as I'm sure we'll get into the boring and the steady and the things that you can just can consistently feed, feed, feed. Those are the things that we are committed to them that do actually create the wealth in our lives. 100%. So I don't want you to undersell this. You know, you've, you've, okay. I won't undersell it for six years in a row. I averaged over 500 referrals a year in my business. I am a number one best selling author, number one, who released. I've had the privilege of speaking on so many stages. I've been on stage in front of people in front of a thousand people before. I've previously been a sought after business coach and. Okay. I mean, that is the real story. Yeah. No, that's what that's what I wanted. That's what I wanted people to hear. So, so, so I think it's really cool. The 500 referrals a year, right? Like if you wouldn't mind, like share with the audience, like tell us about that. How did you do it? What was the method behind that? Like that, that is not by any means a small feat. No, and as you know, because I've had the honor and the privilege of sharing what I, what I do and what I know with, with your real estate team. It's, it's not a 10 minute conversation. It, it became a whole strategy that I deployed for many years in a row. And I will tell you, as I look back on it and as, as I look back at the things that I was able to accomplish, the part that surprises me most about the journey is the consistency at which I was able to do it, right? Because you and I, we spend a lot of time in real estate and mortgage and all that. And we see people come in and they have a great first year and maybe even a great second year, but where's the sustainability? And so it's just, I mean, it just fills my heart for me to look at it and be able to go. Now we, I'm not saying we get 500 referrals a year now. We certainly don't. I got to the point where I was able to pull back a little bit. We still get quite a few referrals every year, but to just be able to consistently do what I did again and again and again and again. That's just, that's, that's, I'm just so proud of it that I was able to do that. And then extract what I did and then share it with others. So the way it all started was I just had to be really clear. Look, I know everybody gets tired of hearing this, but I had to pick a niche. I decided and I can be a little delusional about what I want in a good way. Like I'm literally delusional about how good my life can get. Like, oh, let's see just like my daily prayer is God, show me how good my life can be. That that's it. And so, dude, that is, that is, I want to, let's take a second to talk about that really quick. All right. That's, that is, you're, you're, you're right on so many levels. And I'm, and I'm really glad you said that. I actually put a post out two days ago or I think it was yesterday. I don't know. My days are running together this week. I was at WrestleMania over the weekend. And, hey, thanks for the invite. Yeah. And, um, I put a post out about when I was a kid, I told my grandfather, I would walk out the catwalk to WrestleMania and I was delusional enough to believe that I could, I did it over the weekend. Right. So I walked out the beginning of the show of WrestleMania. Yeah, it was so cool. But the thing that you said is, um, which I think is really cool. And this is why you and I get along so well because I love your energy. And I'm glad you said that is you've built an amazing business because you're delusional enough to believe you could. Yeah. Yeah. I would just, I, when I was niching down, I decided, here's how it worked for me. Um, now let's, let's say the quiet part out loud, um, because it's going to come up eventually. Um, my life is not all sunshine and rainbows. I became, I was married for 20 years and then I became a widow at 45, two years ago. Right. My boys were 14 and 15 when their father passed, but I still say to myself, show me how good it can get. Show me God, show me how good this life can be. So when I was first starting in insurance, I wanted to, I needed, I wanted something consistent. I wanted something repeatable. And so I, I said, again, this is the delusional part. I want to work with people who can refer me more than once. Right. You have to decide, you have to decide what, what is the perfect scenario for you. I want to hang out with cool people that will send me lots of referrals and the referrals that they send me have a timeline. Right. Cause if we think about insurance, it's like, Oh, Hey, Jess, will you take a look at my auto and home insurance? You know, it's coming up for renewal. I don't know when there's no urgency in that situation. And so I literally said, I only want to work with people who have a deadline. And it's like, Oh, well, of course, everyone wants to do that. Yeah, but everyone didn't sit down and think about it again and again. How do I find, how do I get multiple, multiple referral sources, people that have deadlines, they have to have my product. Who has to have product? Who has to have home insurance? You can't get a clear to close. You can't go to closing. You can't do any of that without home insurance. And then it was like, okay, I want to work with, I feel like I want to work with realtors and mortgage lenders. And I had been in that space a lifetime ago, many years ago. So I understood how the business worked. The key, the next key was, and I think people miss this so much as I said, if I want to work with mortgage people and I want to work with real estate people, what value can I bring them? Because I refuse to be just another insurance agent with my hands sticking out going, hey, gimme, gimme, gimme, send me your referrals. What value can I provide to them? How do I help them grow their business so that when their business grows, it also helps my business grow? And that just started along the path of learning different things, studying different things, just learning things in a way that I could then take them. And share it with other people so that they could grow. And along the way, I realized that I'm good at telling stories and I'm, I'm, I'm engaging in people like spending time with me and they, they, they feel better after they spend time with me. So as I was going after this big delusional goal of getting referrals, I realized how I, what gifts that I had that I was able to give back. And then something else, of course. So I did so much of this through social media. Facebook was, was a game of choice, which was amazing. But I also had to look at myself and say, people want to spend time with interesting people, right? If I want all eyes on me, I better be doing something worth looking at. And, you know, I'm not going to put my boobs or my butt on the internet. So I've got to be someone else, right? Right. You know, those pesky values in world. So it had to be something else. And so I, I started going on adventures, taking a family on adventures. And it's talking about different books I was reading and just talking about different runner and different races I was running. And, and people just, they want to be around interesting people. They want to be around people who are good at conversation. They want to be around people who are learning things and have a light. And so it, it, it was mutually beneficial for me when I started doing all that, because it wasn't just about the referrals. It was about creating this energy and this life that there was a year during COVID where I set the goal to run 105 Ks. And I had a big, a big, I had the, I went to the Sherwin Williams and I got the paint that, that you paint on the wall and it becomes a dry erase board. And I put one through 100 on there. And people, I didn't even know that we're following along with that, but hey, what, what, what number are you on? Or, and because of this goal that I set these big things that I had, and I was sharing it with people and I was sharing the realities of it. In, you know, just being more interesting and more open. And they felt like they were going on the journey with me. And I would get messages, like people would tag me in pictures or private message me and be like, I went for a run today because I see you doing it. And if you can do it, I can do it. I'm like, stop my heart. I love it. So I think there's a couple of things in there that you, you touched on that. I think your goal number one, um, you had absolute clarity on where you wanted to go. Um, and I think that's a mistake that most entrepreneurs make because, you know, we're just, we want to do a bunch of shit. And then a lot of times it's like you, especially now we're exposed to so much information, it's like, I want to do this. I want to do that. I want this. I want that. I want this shiny object. Um, I think the, the thing that you said that was really cool that I want my listeners to, to hear is you became extremely linear focused on a niche. And then down to the avatar of client that you wanted, um, and down to the avatar of referral partner that you wanted. So, you know, you got very, very clear. And then the second part of what you said that I think is really important is, um, people overthink marketing, right? And branding and you know, you've done it really well, but also you showed a lifestyle aspect of it, you know, with the running, which, which brought people in. And I think that that's the shit that people just overcomplicate. It's like just be yourself on social media, which is what you've always been. And the tribe that you want is going to find you. And, uh, I think there's another big lesson in that. And I'm glad you brought that up too. Yeah. There's a big disconnect when we try to be one thing in person and another thing offline, right? If they, they see me online and I'm, I'm all bubbly and I'm high energy. And then I walk in the room and my shoulders are hunched over and I'm not looking around and I'm all shy. That's a disconnect and people can, people can see that and they can feel it. So we have to make sure that what we're putting out online, especially with chat, GPT, these days, let's just again, we say the fight works out louder. I'm here where you want to have chat, GPT doing all your social media. And there's no soul in it and there's no personality in it. And people can feel that. And when you walk into room that you're just, you're different and I just refuse to be different, but the thing is I'm not perfect and I'm corky and I show up with no makeup on and I make fun in the golf these days and I make fun of my golf swing and I just, but, but here's another thing. I talked about golf the other day when I was out hitting golf balls and do you know how many people were like, Oh, you should come golf with us and here and there and see, because people, people want to know what you're into. I don't care if you're into crocheting. Let's talk about it. Because if you can exude a passion about it, people are attracted to passion and it's contagious. 100%. Um, another thing is just, if you wouldn't mind touching on this is kind of going to, um, I mean, ever since I've known you, I don't, I don't think I've ever seen you in a bad mood. Um, I don't think I've never seen you not smiling. I don't think I've never, I don't think I've never seen you not happy. Um, and then even when you went through the stuff with your husband, you know, in texts that we were having back and forth in conversations. Obviously it was fucking devastating, but, um, every response and conversation that I got from you was through a positive light. Right. And so I just, I'm such a huge believer in, in mindset is everything like, you know, I think you exude that like go behind that. Tell, tell my listeners about that. Cause I think it, I think it's served you very, very well. Um, and it, and it's contagious. It rubs off on the people around you. So I, I look at the things that I have been able to do. I look at the things that I've been able to accomplish. I look at the vacations that we were able to take as a family, the memories that we have. And even when I look at the most devastating thing that happened to me, which was one day finding out that my husband of 20 years, almost 20 years had, um, aggressive brain cancer. And then literally six months later, him being gone, I was at dinner last night. And I'm the way I was telling it was when I look at that six months, that was literally the, I hope in my heart that that is the hardest six months I ever have to go through. Right. Yeah. But when I look at that, I'll be 48 this year. When I look at that six months, was it terrible? Absolutely. But it's just such a small blip in this life, in this marriage, in this experience that was just so amazing. Like I, if, if I stay in that space too long of poor pitiful me, did that really happen? A, I can slip into victim mentality, which is definitely not me. But B, I feel like I'm almost disrespecting so much of the greatness. Like how can we expect to live an amazing life, but think there's not going to be any suffering. Sure. I got to be married to someone amazing for 20 years. I got to be loved for who I was for 20 years. I got to have two amazing children. And how, how am I going to, how am I going to be negative about that? How am I going to be negative or to sit in pity? I guess is how I is to disrespect everything else. Yeah, that's an amazing way to look at it. Um, and I'm glad you shared and framed that. And for the record, um, if you ever decide to date again, you know, they got to go through me first. I got to sign off on it. And if you're listening to that, just so you know, got it. Got it. So, um, so another thing I think is super cool about you is, right? So one of the biggest mistakes and the show a lot is about investing. And one of the biggest mistakes that a lot of people do is they go out, find their niche, make money, do well, but they don't figure out, you know, you've, you've done very well in learning and figuring out and being curious and getting involved in investing your money. And, um, we don't need to go into super detail on this, but I just want you, especially for the women that are listening, you know what I mean? The entrepreneurs that are out there, just, just touch a little bit. I'm such a huge believer in this of your path. The wealth is investing your money, right? Um, but you know, if you wouldn't mind like, you know, just, just touch on that. Well, I think for so many of us who grew up with nothing, um, when we do start to get a little bit of money, man, it's a twisted relationship and we spend it and we buy a lot of stupid shit. Now look, I live in a newer house. Uh, it's not a cheap house. I'll tell you that and I drive a $90,000 Mercedes. So I'm, my kids go to private school. So I'm not saying I don't love the money and I don't love spending the money. But I, I, when I get the money, I say to myself, what can I do with this money? So here's how I frame it. What can I do with this money to help future guests? Like what, what can I do with it? Because you can't, we, we can't just let it sit, right? That's, I look at money. I look at my money, like it's my employees. Who is making me some money today? My money needs to be making me money. But the first 25 K that I invested, um, I lost, right? We invested it in this, this, um, restaurant type franchise thing. And I think there's still an FBI thing in what lawsuit going on, whatever. Like that money is long gone. And, and it would have been easy to be like, well, somebody scammed me, somebody screwed me, I lost my 25 K. That's it. I'm not going to do anything else with it. But I know if I let Lucisa some money, I better not need that money. I bet I better not. And so I think sometimes when people get a little money, it's like, oh, well, okay, I'm just going to slow down working. You better not slow down working. Like I will, I will intentionally deploy my money. I'm about to send another big wire to you, just FYI, but I, I, uh, when I get the money, I deploy it so that I feel broke again. So that I go for again, I don't, I don't want these reserves sitting around because I'm going to start, I'm going to get a little lazy. I'm just going to say it. I'll get a little lazy. It's so weird. It's so, not weird, but it's so funny. You said that because yesterday I was having the same conversation with somebody where I was like, they're like, oh, well, what, and I'm like, dude, it's going to take me a couple of days because all my money's like tied up in different things. And they're like, what, what, what do you mean? And I'm like, if I've got a ton sitting in the bank, the alarm goes off at 430. I turn that bitch off. That's right. I'm going to bed. Yeah. Like it's like, well, you know, and I'm just 100% transparent. There's a couple of times my alarm's going off at 430. I've looked at my, I've literally going on logged in, looked at my bank account. I'm going back to sleep. And so I'm the same way. Like I deploy it all and can't touch it so that it just keeps my ass motivated. And I agree with you 100% on that. Now we could talk about some big money if we wanted to, right? We could do that. We have both worked our asses off, but, but what started with 10, 15, 20 K, that's what it started with. And that's what it, that's what it consistently needs to be. So I don't care if somebody is like, all right, I only have $100 a month, right? $500 a month. You better start making your money work for you. Like it's not about the money until it's about the money. It's all great spending it and all that right now. But if, if you, anyway, I could just go on forever. No, you're, no, you're 100% right. And you, you, I agree with you. I mean, and the thing is, is that this is what people don't get or understand. So the thing is, both of us were not taught about money correctly. So you, you get it. And then to your point, you spend it. And then you get to some level of buy all the shit you always thought you wanted. And then you realize that, all right, now I got the t-shirt. That was cool, but it's not what I thought it was. And then you think, okay, now I have to hoard it and keep it in the bank because you didn't have it. And that's actually the, your money is slowly dying a slow death because every single day it's not invested. It's going down in value. And we're not taught that. When I, when I start earning some money or extra money, whatever, above what it takes to run my company and my, me and the boys' bougie lifestyle, I look at it like in $20,000 chunks, 20K. Okay. That extra 20K here. What can I do? Where can I invest this? Okay. Well, I want to buy another investment property, residential investment property. So, okay, let's open another LLC and I'm going to need, you know, I'm going to need another 40K, whatever, because I got to put 20% down, whatever. Then that becomes the goal for me. How do I get this, these coins here to become 40K so that I can then take an LLC and buy another $200,000 investment property? Or, you know, I've popped up with you like, I mean, it's just, it's, you see it on your phone and I'm surprised. I'm like, hey, I got extra 25K. Like, are you looking for any extra money? And you're like, I'm always looking for some money, but yeah, okay. You've got to put this into and you're like, I think I could come up with something absolutely because it doesn't have to be 100K, 200K, 300K. I, are we up to, we'll be up to 300,000 by Vanda next week together. No, over three. Oh, we're over that. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, we're over three, but it didn't start like that. It's started small. 20 or 25. And I know that people think, well, that's, that's a big number. Okay, we'll start with 10, but you've got to start somewhere. And you have to, for me, I give it a purpose, right? I got to give the money a purpose because if all we're doing is just making money to pay our bills, then that's going to be a long, that's going to be a long boring existence and I'm just not down with the boring. So you said something there. That's another piece of gold is you're investing with a purpose and your money has a purpose. And so that's another thing too that I think is super cool that you mentioned is that, and that's a lot, that's what a lot of people miss too, is there's the purpose behind it. You know what I mean? Absolutely. So every my life has a purpose. It has an, is it has a, a name. It has a like go do something, deploy, go do something. So that's great advice on investing. Um, I'm going to ask you one last question before we get out of here and ask everybody the same question. Um, well, before I do that, how can people find you on social media if they want to connect with you? Oh, I'm easy. Jessica, that's it. You'll know, you'll know, you'll know me when you see me. Easy enough. Um, so, um, I'm actually interested in hearing this answer from you. So I ask every single person that comes on the show, we name the show, wake up to wealth for two reasons. And we kind of touched on some of this, but one is, I don't believe the average person has ever been taught about money correctly. So I'm trying to wake them up to understand wealth, but I also want them to wake up one day and be wealthy. And wealth has a different purpose for everyone. So I have, I'm going to ask you like I ask everybody, what does waking up to wealth mean to you? So I, you know, we all talk about, we hear a lot of conversations around, oh, what's your bid? Why? And, and I get that and I trust that. And for so many years for me, it was like, well, to make money, to have money. And then somebody said to me, somebody said to me, what's your bid? Why? And it can't be just to make money. And I sat with that for a little bit and I thought, but it is for me to make money. And then I had to dig a little deeper and say, but what does the money actually mean for me? So money to me equals security. It equals safety. It equals when my kids need help and I got them because I took care of my finances. It means my kids aren't going to be saddled with student loan debt. It means that I will be there to help them buy their first investment property. It means that when my elderly mom called me last year and said, I'm behind on my house payment, that I was able to swoop in and help her and then be like, Hey, mom, we really need to get you moved somewhere else. Because how can you help others? And how can you serve if you're living in scarcity? And I'm going to shine my light at the level that I have been called to shine it. If I'm constantly worried about how am I going to pay my bills? So for me, that was a long answer. No, it was a great answer. Waking up to wealth means doing what I want, when I want, with who I want. I love it. Well, I knew you would give us all kinds of good shit. And that's why I wanted to have you come on today. And I greatly appreciate your friendship. I greatly appreciate your confidence and believe it in me to help you steward your money and reach. Yeah. And reaching out to me when you when you need help. And I just appreciate you being you always being authentic and being who you are. And I thank you guys so much. And if you guys watch the show or you're listening, I would tell you guys to all follow her, check her out. She's just an awesome human being built an amazing business. But her mindset and her energy is is just one of the things that just always I really, really appreciated. And I thank you so much for being. You know, I'm always down to run my mouth and talk about talk about all the things. Appreciate you coming on the show today. Sure. Talk to you soon. All right, this next segment is brought to you by my good friends at a cruelty. Now, if you run a business, most business owners neglect their back office and they don't even know where to go or who to trust when it comes to their financials or CPA or taxes. That's where a cruelty comes in. You can trust them. They can give you advice and they understand the back office. Listen, you're not running a business correctly if you don't have a hold of this. And it's really hard to trust people that are out there. And most CPAs, frankly, work for the IRS and don't work for you. That's not the case with a cruelty. Check my good friends out at a cruelty for any needs that you have when it comes to helping with your back office, getting your book straight, getting your taxes correct, and they guide you and give you advice, which most firms don't. 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