The Equifax Foundation is dedicated to helping people Build Financial Capability Because, a single financial opportunity Can change the trajectory of families and communities for generations.

Learn more at Equifax.com/foundation ♪ I've got a brand new feeling - I'm Jacqueline Schadeck, and I'm soon to be your favorite Certified Financial Planner.

♪ And I'm feeling good - My name's Chris Corinthian, I'm a financial literacy expert, and financial coach.

♪ Ready for action - We are a professional powerhouse.

♪ I've got a brand new feeling - [Jacqueline] So I handle the numbers.

- [Chris] And I try to see what is their relationship with money.

- So we meld the two together to give you the most financial empowerment.

♪ And I'm feeling good (upbeat music) - So, Jacqueline, what have we got today?

- Well, we're headed on down to Lawrenceville, Georgia.

- Okay.

- We're gonna meet the Taylor family.

- I'm Marcus Taylor.

- And I'm Zaneta Taylor.

- And we're- - The Taylors.

- The Taylor Family.

(record scratching) Oh, we're the Taylors.

- [Jacqueline] They've actually been together for a little over a decade, but married for six.

- [Zaneta] We have a beautiful family, two boys.

Jaxon is our 13 year old, he's in eighth grade.

He's a dynamic kiddo.

- Preston is a ball of energy and character.

I say he's a, he's six going on 60.

- I love that.

Let's hear some more.

- They are seeking help on how to start building generational wealth, and how to properly prepare a will and other estate planning documents.

- You know, you need a will, power of attorney.

- Yes.

- All these different things, but, of course, there's areas that we don't know.

- [Zaneta] We wanna try to build generational wealth, and protect that generational wealth.

- Now, you know, we're not attorneys, but, I'm glad that they reached out to ask us for legitimate information so we can point them in the right direction.

Doing a house call today.

- Knock, knock, here come the mentors.

(laughs) Here we go.

(upbeat music) - Hi.

Zaneta.

- I'm Jacqueline.

- Come on in.

- Chris.

- Come on in.

- Pleasure to meet you.

Nice to meet you, absolutely.

- Come on in.

- Thank you.

- Yeah, feel free to have a seat.

We're so glad y'all made it.

(gentle music) - This is beautiful.

- Thank you so much.

- [Jacqueline] It smells great.

And somebody likes plants.

- Absolutely.

- Yes, I'll take the- - Glory.

He's a plant dad.

(everyone laughs) - Well, we know planning starts with you two.

Can you share a little bit about yourselves?

- So, I work for a nonprofit.

I've been working in a nonprofit for over 10 years, but the current nonprofit I've been at for eight.

- I work for a corporate office here in Atlanta for about 11 years now.

- What do you guys like to do?

Do you like to go out?

What do you like to do for leisure?

- I like gardening.

I like to go outside.

- We like to travel.

We wanna expose the boys to as much as possible.

- Do you give your kids an allowance now?

- Mm-hmm, we give the little one cash, and now the older one, he has his own debit card.

- They have apps now.

- Yeah.

- For the chores.

- It's a different day and age now, but yeah.

- So, in order for us to come up with a good roadmap or game plan, let's talk about where we are right now.

Like, what assets do you have now, what things do you have?

- So, this home, we are renting.

We do have stocks, I have a 401(k), of course.

- I have one of those, and I guess it's actually called a 403(b) in the nonprofit world.

- So, Marcus, you have life insurance, right?

- [Marcus] Yes.

- And, Zaneta, you don't?

- I do now.

- Yeah.

- Yes.

- Yeah.

- A little backstory too, my mom had a stroke.

Hold old is Preston?

- How's she doing?

- Six, six years ago.

She's actually in short-term rehabilitation right now, but that triggered us, because she was in a coma for so long, to get paperwork in line, and just things like, what was it?

Advanced directives?

Because she hadn't passed on, but she hadn't selected someone to make decisions for her, and she was in a coma for a certain amount of time.

So, I talked to Marcus, and he was like "You probably have life insurance "through your job."

And I was like "Well, let me just sign up for it, "and register."

So, I have life insurance as well.

We actually also got policies for our kids.

- So, my mother, she passed away a few years ago.

My mom had a lot set in place, but there were certain things that weren't, and my dad had to go through a lot to kind of jump some barriers, and get through some things.

Losing my mom really opened my eyes to wanting to make sure that my kids were taken care of, so they don't have to go through what my father went through, and that process.

- Thank you for sharing that with us.

How long was that process for your parents?

- About a year of him going back and forth.

- A year?

Just imagine, when you think you have closure to this situation and you can move on, having to relive that every single day for up to a year.

- If things were set in place, it wouldn't have been that difficult for my dad, so I just wanna make sure that we are doing everything we that we can to make sure that that doesn't happen.

- Do you have anything like wills in place or trusts?

- I don't have a will right now.

I'm ready to write one, that's where I'm at.

- Yeah, same here.

I don't have a will, but this is the perfect opportunity to do it.

We don't know exactly what we need to do, and that's why we're kind of looking at you guys to help us understand what that looks like.

- The best time to have this in place was yesterday.

- Better late than never.

- Our money's in the bank, and in investment assets right now.

And we're trying to figure out how we can transition that to our boys.

Not in account management, but in future generational wealth planning.

- I'm glad that they know what they want.

Chris and I can't make the decision for them, so being able to support them in their decisions, the perfect recipe.

- Well, did y'all wanna meet the boys?

- Yeah, absolutely.

- Absolutely.

- Let's do it.

- I'll let you go first.

- Thanks.

(upbeat music) - [Jacqueline] Hi guys.

- Come on.

- How y'all doing?

- I got some people for y'all to meet.

- My name's Jaxon.

- My name's Preston.

- You can tell these boys have been planted with the seeds of growth and development.

I wonder how that's gonna translate into their understanding of how money works.

All right, who is the most responsible?

(upbeat music) (everyone laughs) - So, who is the biggest saver in the family?

(upbeat music) - Preston.

- Preston, Preston.

(everyone laughs) - No, I like to spend it, I don't save it.

- Oh my God.

- Who's the best dancer in the family?

- I think (indistinct).

- Yeah, he got us all beat.

- Okay, we about to break out in dance now.

All right, let's see what's going on here.

- Let's go.

(laughs) (upbeat music) - That's cool.

(upbeat music) They got tomatoes, bell peppers.

They got a farmer's market in their backyard.

- Growing a garden isn't the simplest thing to do.

- This family garden is a reflection of number one, doing things together, but planting the seeds now for a future harvest.

- Here's a tomato back here.

- Oh my goodness.

- Here's a red one right here.

- Wow.

- Can you pick that one?

We can't take that one inside.

- So do you all incorporate this with your recipes, and things that you cook on the regular?

- Yeah, so Preston picks 'em, Jaxon will come out and help us, and then we wash them off, and we do incorporate the tomatoes, and the peppers, and even basal here in the middle, and we blend it all together to make yummy sauces for Italian food.

- That's so important 'cause when you think about things like generational wealth people automatically just think money, but you're talking about the time you spend together, and the recipes, and how that can possibly be one of those things that goes down generationally.

- I love that thought, passing down knowledge from one generation to the next.

- I love this.

They have a vision, we have the tools, and now we're in place to help them see that vision through.

- So we're gonna get together, we're gonna work on a plan, and just come up with the best strategy that works best for you all.

- Great.

- Okay?

- Thanks.

- All right.

(laughs) - Let's do it.

- Let's go.

(upbeat music) - Now it's time to cook up a plan.

We know where they want to go, we know what they have, now let's help them build a strategy to get them to that destination.

- The Taylors shared with us that they don't have any of their estate documents in place.

- It's really important that they get this ball rolling now.

- The first thing I want us to focus on is life insurance.

So, I wanna make sure that we've talked about how much coverage they actually need, how to go about implementing that, because there's so many different types of insurance.

- That's an excellent idea.

I think that'll be perfect for them.

- A lot of people try to DIY their estate plan, and become their own attorneys, and draft up their own documents.

But my fear is that when you do that you're not a professional, you're not trained in estate planning and in law, and so it's important that we use somebody who is a trained professional in that to make sure that we don't miss any boxes.

- Absolutely.

I think working with the kids is really gonna be important.

We're gonna focus on Jaxon and Preston, and help build on what they already have established.

I love how the boys already have a sense of financial literacy.

They're already empowered to learn about money, and how money applies to their lives.

So, I'm just gonna give them some tools and resources where they can still work together, and build on that for generations to come.

- That sounds like a great plan.

You take the kids, I'll take the parents, we'll get asset protection and generational wealth planning in place, and then they'll be set.

- Sounds like a plan.

- Cheers.

- Cheers.

(upbeat music) - One of the biggest gaps in the Taylor's plan is having their estate documents in place.

Today I've brought them to the estate attorneys office so that we can get that gap filled.

So, estate planning.

Have you guys ever met with an estate attorney before?

- No.

- We have not.

- This will be the first time.

- First time.

- Yeah.

- Okay.

Have you ever met with a financial planner before?

- No.

- No.

(laughs) - So, a big first day for you guys.

- Yes.

- Well, today my job is to be your advocate.

I'm extremely proud of the Taylor family for seeking professional guidance.

There's so much bad financial advice out there, and I'm glad they are not falling victim to that.

My family was one of those families that fell victim to poor financial advice which caused us to lose everything, including the home that I grew up in as a child.

So right now your approximate salaries are how much?

- I'm at 75.

- 75.

- 60.

- And 60.

Let's go back to the life insurance conversation because this is a big piece in your generational wealth plan.

So, I know you both have life insurance through work, right?

- Correct.

- Yes.

- Okay.

Can you remind me how much that is?

- So, I think I have 150,000.

- There's different ways that you can calculate your life insurance need.

From what the Taylors are telling me, they wanna make sure that their boys are taken care of if they leave the Earth prematurely.

We're just gonna do a simple straight line calculation that says in 10 years, if you were to leave, we wanna make sure that your boys would be covered for those next 10 years.

The easiest way to do that is to simply take their current incomes, multiple that by 10, and that's their life insurance need.

So if we were to just take easy math, 600,000, 750,000.

What I notice is that there's a pretty to gap between where you guys are right now with your coverage, and where you really need to be to make sure that your family feels comfortable.

- Right.

- Now, there's a few ways that we can fill that gap.

We can either look to do additional group insurance, which is what you have through your employer.

- Okay.

- Or we can look to outside insurance.

- With my insurance through the job, they don't really go over exactly what it is.

We know that insurance is something that we need, but it's not explained, like there could be more.

- Now, one of the benefits to adding additional insurance outside of your jobs' policies, is that this insurance is what we call portable, meaning that no matter what job you have, wherever you're working, you can always take this insurance with you.

- Okay, sounds good.

- I think it'll be really good.

Oh, here's Josh.

- Hey guys, I'm Josh Nelson, I'm gonna be your attorney for the process.

- Good to meet you.

- Marcus Taylor.

- I'm Josh Nelson, from Nelson Eldercare Law, the managing attorney.

Jacqueline, thanks so much for bringing them in.

It definitely helps to have a good advocate to make things a little simpler as we go through the estate planning checklist.

The estate planning checklist really consists of five foundational tools, the first one being the will.

Then, we talk about a HIPAA release, a living will, a financial power of attorney, and advanced healthcare directive.

I like to break the checklist up into what we do while we're alive in here, and then talk about the estate and what happens afterwards is kind of the second part of that checklist.

- Okay.

- The most important parts to me are the parts while we're alive, and that starts with what we call a HIPAA release.

It's a really simple form, you already fill it out by yourself at the doctors.

It's not witnessed or notorized.

And it just says who can speak with our doctors about our medical records.

It's not a decision making tool, and there's no order.

We can put as many people on there as you want.

- Interesting.

- The first decision-making tool is about our bodies and our health, though.

A lot of people call it a medical power of attorney, but it's called an advanced healthcare directive.

- Oh, interesting.

I wonder if that's what we needed for mom.

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

- The good thing about an advanced healthcare directive is while you're healthy nobody can make medical decisions for you.

The most important tool in my mind though is the financial power of attorney.

- We need that one.

The financial power of attorney is so important to have in your estate plan.

A lot of times we thinking that just because we're married we can operate on the behalf of our spouse if something happens.

Unfortunately, that's not how the law is written so we have to have this financial power of attorney in place.

- What this does is allows for normally your spouse is your first financial agent, to handle things that are individually titled in your name.

So maybe a bank account that just has one of your guys' names on it, and isn't joint, but especially retirement accounts.

- That's a great point that you bring up.

You guys each have 401(k), and they operate the same way.

- Okay.

- And a big part of this is not just access, but it's protection.

So, in the event that something happened where you ended up in the hospital, your spouse could sign those hospital contracts without taking on the liability.

Buried in those contracts is often a paragraph that says if something happens to Marcus where his insurance doesn't pay, you could be on the hook if you sign it the wrong way.

One that's uncomfortable to talk about, especially whenever we're a little bit younger, is called a living will.

And, so this is not your last will, which dictates where your stuff goes, this is what we want as far as extreme medical treatments.

- Okay.

- It's a really good gift to give to your family, even your spouse, and so by doing a living will, you can give your spouse, your kids, your parents clear direction on what you do and don't want as far as treatment goes.

- Gotcha.

- Those are the main tools that we focus on while we're alive.

Now, we're gonna start talking about where your stuff goes.

- All right.

- And there's two main ways of doing that.

One, is through non-probate transfer, which is we avoid the court system.

And, one is through probate.

A big misconception is that a will skips probate court, it does not.

It just tells the court where we want our stuff to go.

- And probate's very expensive and time consuming, right?

- So, generally probate's gonna cost about 3% of your estate, or the stuff that transfers through court.

There's a lot of ways to skip probate without jumping all the way to a trust.

One of the best ways is beneficiary designations that doesn't require an attorney or any kind of legal fees, your bank actually takes care of this with you.

It's just a form you fill out.

You probably have each other listed as the beneficiaries.

- Mm-hmm.

- Yeah.

- What about your boys?

These are the kind of things that we need to plan for.

A lot of families will decide to use a trust because it can distribute money over time.

Whereas a will will just give them a lump sum when they're 18 or sometimes 21.

Sometimes we can make a plan without having to jump to that level of expense or complexity.

- So you can build your estate plan as you build your will.

- The tools can build upon themselves, and especially now that we know that we can tier in different levels, it's not even a cost issue.

We can always find something that works with your guys' financial plan.

- From what I'm hearing from Josh, and from you, I really think that it's important as your financial advocate, that you get this done.

Are you ready to start today?

- Yes.

- Absolutely.

- We'll do it.

- Let's do it.

- Really proud of Zaneta and Marcus today for taking the step, first for working with Jacqueline, making sure they have somebody to give them the advice that they need, but ultimately deciding to move forward with their estate plan so they can build generational wealth for their two kids.

Their boys are gonna start with a leg up over their peers, and that's amazing.

(upbeat music) - I'm heading back to the Taylors' home to discuss ways to continue building values and financial literacy in their family.

That will ultimately help them steward their generational wealth for years and years to come.

(upbeat music) Yeah, so, how did everything go?

- It was mind blowing.

- Really?

- We learned so much in that meeting.

From trust to wills.

- A lot of people don't even venture out and learn these things because they think it's complicated or its too hard, or they really don't know where to start, right?

- Right.

- And that's why we're here, just to help you develop your plan, right?

Really help it go into place through estate planning.

Having a real systematic and organized way.

And then hearing you talk about the difference between wills and trusts.

It's all about building the legacy.

Building that foundation for generations to come.

- Absolutely.

- But, a lot of people, when they're thinking about estate planning, they're only talking about the tangible, like the monetary, the assets that they have, but it really comes down to the values that you hold as a family.

One of the things I want to charge you with is to come up with a mission statements.

Most people associate mission statements with businesses, and big organizations.

But the family is sort of like a business, and a big organization as well.

I know you've worked in corporate, so mission statements for the business or organizations.

And even with the nonprofit that you work for, they probably have a mission statement.

- We do.

(laughs) - Exactly.

So, because you're a family organization, it's always good just to have a mission statement for the family as well.

What do we stand for?

What is it that we wanna do?

And how are we gonna do it?

These are the building blocks that we wanna establish?

And these are the things that we wanna grow from.

So, just, no pressure, no rush.

I just wanna kind of hear you all brainstorm on some of those things.

- I think starting with God first.

- God first, absolutely.

Us being a family of faith, that's the center of our home.

- Mm-hmm.

- So definitely starting with God first.

I would say integrity.

(indistinct) we're raising two young boys to be men of integrity.

- I'm blown away.

I'm actually witnessing something that's gonna last for generations.

- Personal growth, spiritual growth, mental growth is really important towards whatever their goals are in life, right?

- When you're empowered financially, then that gives you a sense of freedom.

One of the quote that ambassador Andrew Young says is to live in a system of free enterprise, and not know the rules of free enterprise must be the definition of slavery.

- Mm.

- So what are some of those things that you do with the boys that kind of brings them to the table?

- We show 'em how to save, how to put their money in, and now the 13 year old, he has a debit card now.

- [Zaneta] He does.

- So he's learning how to- - He does.

- Instead of just having cash, but be able to use your debit card, and how to properly track what you're spending and stuff like that.

- They already have things like a bank account.

They have debit cards.

They have chores where they're paid monetarily for.

These tools are gonna help empower their sons to be more financially savvy, and confident as they move forward in life.

In addition to coming up with their mission statement, I gave them a little homework assignment.

- So tonight we've been given $100 cash to go shopping at the grocery store.

- They're tasked with going shopping, and getting items from the store that they'll be able to use in their next project.

But, the thing is, the parents aren't doing the shopping, the boys are.

Now The Taylors can sit back, and actually watch their sons develop a sense of independence to know that they'll be good stewards of what they're entrusted with.

(upbeat music) - We're excited to partner with Chef Mo so we can help The Taylors create their own family recipe that can be passed on for generations.

- Hello, hello.

- Hello.

(Chris laughs) - How are you?

- Welcome in, welcome in.

- I see you're busy working away.

- Oh yeah.

Getting ready, getting ready, getting ready.

- Some of our most memorable experiences in life come through the five senses, what we hear, what we see, what we smell, what we taste and what we touch.

This is the perfect activity that will probably be memorable for the rest of their lives.

We've been talking about different things like generational wealth, and values, and the things they wanna pass down.

- Right.

- So we're really looking forward to this experience.

- We wanted to come to the best so you can help us bring out the mission that we're really trying to share with the family.

- Awesome.

We're gonna have a great time.

- I love it.

Oh, right on time.

How's it going?

Good to see you.

- Surprise, you're cooking up your own family recipe today.

- Surprise, surprise.

(laughs) We're getting ready to start cooking.

- We brought some groceries.

- Groceries, yay, thank you.

(upbeat music) - Remember when we talked about that life insurance that we wanna have in that generational wealth plan?

It's kind of like putting your apron on, making sure that you have that layer of asset protection.

So, today we're going to help you build on your family recipe that you shared with us.

- Before we get started, how was the shopping experience?

Tell us about that.

- Well, they did all the shopping.

(everyone laughs) - So, did you do any pricing?

Did you pick 'em out?

Did you kind of see how much stuff costs?

How was that process for you?

- Yeah.

- You did?

Okay.

(laughs) Tell me about that.

- We usually looked at the prices, and we wrote them down in my notes, and then after we tallied them all up, and subtracted them from our budget halfway through, and we saw how much money that we had left.

- That's awesome, I love that.

- Did you come in under budget?

- We did.

It was definitely like 60- - Mm-hmm.

- It was in the 60s.

- And did you all bring some stuff from the garden?

- We brought a few things.

We brought some rosemary, we brought some basal.

We also got some fresh Roma tomatoes.

- Fantastic.

- And a couple of green peppers.

- And you guys grow that in your own garden?

- Did we grow those in the garden?

- Wow.

- Yeah.

- So, do you guys wanna get started making your own pasta?

- Yeah.

- Let's do it.

- Okay.

(upbeat music) - Making the pasta could be considered the base of your lasagna, right?

It takes a little bit of extra work to get your foundation together.

The same thing happens with building your generational wealth plan.

Can you imagine how great this is gonna be for them to have with their kids, and their kids, their kids?

This is gonna be a great memory for them.

- There we go.

(everyone laughs) - What questions have come up over this experience?

- One of the biggest questions that I had were are these documents set in stone once we make these decisions?

- The reality is financial planning is fluid, and as your finances grow, your portfolio grows, we're gonna make those changes in that slow process, just like how we made the pasta, we mixed the eggs in, it's a slow process of building over time.

I hope that The Taylors understand that their generational wealth is going to be built one step at a time.

- Everything about this process is starting from scratch, so no matter where their starting point is they know they can build something of value.

- That's lasagna.

- That's what I'm talking about, Preston.

And one thing I love that I'm seeing right now is how everybody's being involved.

Some families, they just keep everything to the parents, and others wanna be inclusive, and get the whole family involved.

You see how we're doing this, how the whole family is building this family recipe?

- [Zaneta] Look at that?

Those are our arms (indistinct).

Look at that.

Yes, sir.

Yes.

Hey, we did it.

- Chris and I, we're so proud of you guys for taking this next step in your family's generational wealth plan.

- Did you come up with a family mission statement?

- Yes.

- We did.

- We did.

- Okay.

- So, we have four pillars that go into our mission statement.

It's gonna be faith, integrity, honor and growth.

And then our statement is "Our family is committed "to living with faith as our foundation, "honoring others with integrity, "and fostering growth, "building a legacy rooted in loved, respect, "and continuous improvement."

- Wow, this is really powerful.

Everything in their mission statement encompasses everything that we've known about them from the beginning.

I love that.

Just hearing everything you've been through up to this point, with the challenges that you've faced with your parents, it's a lot.

And I know that you all are really taking this to heart as far as building what's for the future for the Taylors.

It's really about those things, when it comes to the assets, the physical things that you own, but more so the things that money can't buy.

- We are light years ahead of where we were even in thinking about some of these things.

We learned a lot about some barriers that we didn't even know existed that aren't gonna be barriers anymore.

- Glad that we could tailor your plan to you.

- Ah.

- See what you did there.

- That's a good one, that's a good one.

- Now they have their estate plan, their plan for life insurance, and we're adding in this family recipe, they're set for success.

Right, Taylor Family on three.

One, two, three- - [All] Taylor Family.

(everyone clapping) - [Chris] Right on time.

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