TCC Seniors hear financial advice from Dale Alexander

Feb. 1—Thomas County Central High School hosted a presentation by Dale Alexander, founder of Alexander & Company, to an audience of 290 senior students regarding finances on Tuesday morning.

Alexander, a Certified Financial Planner and Chartered Financial Consultant, said that getting rich, the gold standard of success, had nothing to do with money.

"Rich has nothing to do with money," he said. "You can be homeless and be rich. You can be rich in having a lot of friends, be rich in having good health, being rich in being content with what you have and don't have. Wealth is what people think of when they think of having money."

Opening up his presentation, he asked the audience of students to give him 50 minutes of their time, saying that he could change their entire life.

"I'm going to tell you something that will change your grand-children's grand-children's lives," he explained.

Speaking on how wealth presents itself, a millionaire, he said, isn't always someone you can pick off the street, but rather could be your neighbor, your plumber, or anyone.

"You would never know a millionaire by how they look," he said.

Before breaking down the financial tips and tricks, Alexander broke down the impact that large amounts of wealth can have on someone, from easier decisions to morals.

"Money makes a good person better and a bad person worse," he said. "Money is the great magnifier of what's in your heart."

Acknowledging the impact of wealth, Alexander continued on to discuss the average debt of American households, and the types of debt that are often encountered throughout life.

"The average household debt, not counting what you owe on your house, household debt is about $38,000 for the average family," "What kind of debt can you have? Cars, student loans, credit cards, right?"

Alexander said that debt was something that comes out of nowhere sometimes, but he warned the students about their first paychecks once they got their first job.

"Most all of you in this room, you don't have your first real job, yet, and when you get out and get your first real job, I remember mine, you're gonna go from making basically nothing to the most money you've seen in your life, at least on a regular basis," he said.

Instead of spending 100% of the check, Alexander proposed a reframing of the mind, a new perspective that he said would help save them from a future of spending more than they have.

"When you get that first job paycheck, instead of taking and spending all 100%, I want you to stop and only spend 70% of it. I want you make your 70, your 100," he said. "It's still going to be the most money you've ever seen in your life, I want you go from nothing and stop at 70."

The average American, he said, doesn't stop at 100% with their paycheck and that's one of the glaring flaws of the financial culture.

"We load up on debt and live on a 105% of that first pay check, but we're better than that," Alexander said.

Alexander explained that the 30% that is saved from each paycheck, is to be used in two ways; 20% of it should be put into savings, while the other 10% is donated or given to others in need.

"Everything about life changes when you start giving," he said.

According to Alexander, allowing just one paycheck to be 100% spent ruins the entire process of living financially sound.

Alexander said that he knows that giving 10% away went against one of the biggest lies the world tells those who are trying to be successful, that they always have to be getting more for themselves.

"What we're looking at, most of the day, every day, is telling me to get more for myself," he said. "To hoard more for myself, to keep more for myself, and that the way to success and happiness in the world today is by serving ourselves and it's the world's greatest lie."

The new perspective that comes with giving, he said, is one of the golden keys to hope, happiness, peace and joy, something he said few people have today.

"If you want a life of hope, maybe you don't, but if you want a life of hope and of happiness and peace and joy, something so few people today have, it's about flipping the script and becoming second and serving others."

Alexander went on to discuss the other easy pitfalls of the financial world, which includes tarnishing perspectives with the perfect lives of social media.

"When you post stuff, is it your best or is it your worst," he said. "You put your best on social media. you put on that prettiest dress, that nicest hair, that best pose, those sickest beats, you know what I'm talking about, you put that best picture."

Encouraging followers to reach for a lifestyle that isn't financially sound, he said, is harmful to a life lived to its fullest economically.

"This is killing us financially," he said.

Other problems, he said, include a lack of attachment to the future. Alexander made it clear that it is a great struggle to sympathize with the stranger that is the future-self, the one students could be helping with the decisions made or not made following Tuesday's lecture.

"I'm taking care of 30-year-into-the-future you today financially," he said. "I'm taking care of future you, today. And your future family would love to run into your life right now and give you a hug and thank you for what you're about to do today."

And lastly, the biggest obstacle to financial prosperity, the boredom zone inherent in using the 20% of every paycheck to wisely invest in a future that's hard to imagine. Alexander said it was their chance, now, to leave that money alone and make it into something greater.

"What does the average person do? Spend it," he said. "You're not going to do that, you're gonna keep it, you're gonna roll it, you leave that alone, you leave that alone."

From stocks to funds, real estate to compound interest, he said that these tricks are what the wealthy have figured out and the broke hate.

"This is what the wealthy have figured out and the broke hate," he said. "They know what's coming down the road, and these boring years are going to get replaced by exciting years late. There's nothing magical, they just figured it out."

To help his audience of students get started, Alexander explained that wealth doesn't come from nowhere and, to start, their best avenue to begin is mutual funds.

"Think of it like a bucket and let's say all of you want to invest in stocks, in companies like Microsofts and Apples and Teslas and Googles, right? Amazons and Walmarts. But I don't know where to put it, most of us don't," he said. "And so you take your money and all of these different investors want to invest different amounts of money, and imagine it like a bucket, well you send your $20, right, into the mutual fund company, and the mutual fund manager studies companies, all day, every day."

With lives spent talking with stockholders, examining CEOs and checking the numbers twice with their financial degrees from Harvard, Alexander said that letting the investors do the work for you is the power of a mutual fund.

"You let them do it," he said. "I will let them make my money."

Alexander added the sooner the students start, the sooner it all starts paying dividends and everything changes.

"The faster you start this, the more you have it," he said. "Now, when should I start, I say start as fast as you start getting money. $30 birthday card, take $10 and put it into a mutual fund. I just want you start being an investor, because when you start investing, any amount, everything changes."

Principal Jamie Thompson thanked Alexander and said that he wished that he had someone like the CFP to explain these things to him when he was young.