Today we’d like to introduce you to Laurie Itkin.
Hi Laurie, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
Like many children, my mother received an allowance from her father. But unlike most children, she received that allowance into her 60’s. The allowance stopped only when her father died. My mother received financial support from her father because, as a teacher and twice-divorced mother of two, she could not make ends meet on her own. Her teacher’s salary didn’t cover the kind of lifestyle she wanted to live. Observing my mother always wanting more taught me a lot about the importance of understanding the difference between wants and needs and living below one’s means.
My grandparents on my father’s side didn’t have much money. I was 24 when my paternal grandmother died, and she left me $1,600. Although I wanted to spend that windfall on clothes and shoes, I knew I needed to begin investing for my future. I was employed but had already been laid off twice and concluded that I couldn’t count on a man or a job to provide financial stability. I had to build a financial cushion myself.
In thinking about whether I would save or invest that $1,600, there was only one clear choice: invest in the stock market. I recalled an eye-opening chart presented by Wharton Professor Jeremy Siegel when I was studying finance that demonstrated that over the long run (despite its short-term risk of going down), the stock market generated higher returns than other asset classes, such as bonds or certificates of deposit. Because I was in my mid-20s, I had quite a long time horizon and knew that stocks were the place I wanted to invest my cash.
In my Amazon best-selling book, Every Woman Should Know Her Options: Invest Your Way to Financial Empowerment, I explain the decisions and trade-offs I made regarding spending, adopting a frugal lifestyle, forgoing graduate school (because I didn’t want to take on more student-loan debt), renting instead of buying, and delaying marriage and family.
A few months before I got married at age 39, I told my fiancé I wanted a prenup. My mother had depended on men financially, and I didn’t want a man to depend on me. The decision I made to invest that $1,600 inheritance (not merely save it) was the most important wealth-building decision I made in my life. It was the seed for how I became a millionaire before I turned 40, a feat that would not have been possible had I chosen to keep that money in the bank or spend it on something I WANTED but didn’t NEED.
I’m 53 now and have spent the last decade doing work to elevate women’s financial literacy. I specialize in educating and empowering women during and after divorce because divorce is often the largest financial transaction in one’s life. I have no doubt that had my mother not died at age 67, she would have run out of money within a few years.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not, what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
I changed careers and became an investment advisor in 2012. After having invested as a hobby for two decades, I thought I would make a job out of what I loved doing. Going from a corporate salary and benefits to no salary whatsoever was scary, particularly when my husband had also left the corporate world to start his own business.
I needed to attract clients and determined that writing a book would be the best way to share my investment philosophy. It took me nine months to write my book, and I spent entire weekends writing until midnight. Most people do not have the discipline to do that, or they are simply pulled in too many directions between work and family obligations. My husband missed me when I was holed up in the office but supported my efforts to earn an income. And that book became an Amazon best-seller in three categories because I taught investing in a language that everyone can understand.
I started building my client base as a financial advisor and then decided to study to become a certified divorce financial analyst, also known as a CDFA. I didn’t know what I was doing during those first few divorce cases, but I now have over 250 divorce cases under my belt. In just a few years, I have become an expert in dividing equity compensation in divorce and mediators and attorneys throughout the state refer couples to me. I was also just nominated to the board of directors of the Association of Divorce Financial Planners, which is comprised of the top divorce financial planners in the country.
I currently manage nearly 100 brokerage, trust and retirement accounts as a financial advisor at Coastwise Capital Group in La Jolla, and also work on about 50 divorce cases each year as a divorce financial planner through my own financial consulting firm, The Options Lady. I work 60-hour weeks but make time to exercise nearly every day because, without physical exercise, my brain becomes less efficient. Performing complicated financial analysis for divorcing clients and trading options for investment clients requires brainpower. I work a lot, but I get to work on a new “puzzle” every day, and that keeps me motivated.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
The first half of the day, I manage investment and retirement accounts as a financial advisor through my affiliation with Coastwise Capital Group, and then in the afternoons, I meet with clients who are preparing for or going through a divorce in my capacity as a certified divorce financial analyst. In my Google and Yelp reviews, I am most often described as responsive, affordable, helpful, and caring. Couples with many assets or assets that are a combination of marital and separate property can benefit from using a CDFA. I either work as a financial neutral to both spouses or as an advocate to one spouse, usually the wife. I often work with same-sex couples.
Mediators and attorneys throughout California refer clients to me when they need a financial expert to determine the community property portion of equity compensation, such as restricted stock units (RSUs) and stock options. Most people do not understand the tax implications of dividing vested and non-vested equity compensation, and I educate them. Tens of thousands and even hundreds of thousands of dollars are at stake, so if a couple can hire a neutral expert like myself, they won’t have to spend thousands of dollars on attorneys to find out what is a 50/50 division.
How do you think about happiness?
I love the competitive aspect of playing squash and pickleball. Squash has been referred to as “physical chess,” and pickleball is just tons of fun! I enjoy taking improv comedy classes with my husband at Finest City Improv in Hillcrest. It gives us an opportunity to act silly and be funny. I also feel a sense of purpose when I volunteer for organizations that focus on financial literacy, such as Savvy Ladies and the San Diego Financial Literacy Center. I think I am most happy when I am learning. I have a thirst for knowledge and find it so interesting to learn about the world.
Contact Info:
- Email: laurie@theoptionslady.om
- Website: TheOptionsLady.com
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheOptionsLady
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/the-options-lady-san-diego-3
