Taking the Next Best Step

Susan B, a twenty-eight year-old housing policy analyst in the Pacific Northwest, has been blind since birth.  “Being blind is just part of who I am, I’m proud of my blindness and of what I do and have achieved.”  Susan has been working since she was 16.  “I started by washing tables at a local fast food establishment, then I graduated to sandwich maker.  After college, a string of progressively more responsible positions led to her current management position.

“I was beginning to make pretty good money, and I knew there was this financial planning thing out there, that was maybe important to my future, but I didn’t know where to turn.”

Susan’s first order of business was to learn more about money.  “I had seen several friends of mine get into trouble with credit cards, so I was terrified about falling into that trap,” she says.  “I didn’t want to get into debt; I didn’t want to have to owe someone every month.” 

Susan started by doing her research and reading several books on financial planning for women.  “I have a few male friends that like to talk about money, but their approach is so . . . well, male.  I wanted to find someone or some program that would talk to me as a woman,” she says.  “I mean, this is not earth shattering information, but men and women are different.  I think sometimes the ways the sexes relate to money are different too.”

Growing up, Susan did not have the best of financial role models.  “My mother, oh god my mother—after her divorce, she didn’t even know how to balance a check book.” 

“I never wanted to be like that.” 

Susan read the book Women and Money by Suze Orman, which helped her to gain the confidence to take her first few financial planning steps. 

Susan learned the lessons well. “It’s actually not that hard,” she says.  “Just figure out what you need to do and take the first step, one thing at a time.”  She says that it is easy to get overwhelmed with the choices and strategies involved in financial planning.  “Just take the next best step, do that slowly, watch the results, and feel good about it.  You do not have to do everything at once, just one smart step at a time.”

The first thing Susan did was to open a savings account with TD Ameritrade.  This promotional account, co-marketed with the Orman book, is specifically marketed to women.  Participants automatically invest $50 per month into a savings or retirement account, and after one year, the institution adds $100 to the account.  “I wanted to start building savings and an emergency account, but really I wanted the free $100," Susan says. 

Her next order of business was to get a credit card.  “I realized, that credit cards are not inherently evil, and that I had learned to trust myself enough to get one.  It was more difficult than Susan thought to get a credit card.  It was not that she had poor credit; it was just that she had no credit at all.  In the end, Susan elected to accept a secured credit card with a small limit so she could start building her credit.   One year later, with 12 months of on-time payments, continuing employment, and no late charges, Susan’s credit score has risen substantially.

Susan also contributes 8% of her salary to her company’s 403(b) program for retirement.  Prompted by her income tax preparation software, she also opened a traditional IRA for 2007.  “The software said if I put $2,000 into an IRA, instead of owing about $500, I would receive a refund of $1,000.  “That was not a hard decision to make!” she says.

Susan’s next step?

“I was talking with someone who works in the mayor’s office; she was telling me that there were some special programs for people with disabilities to assist them in purchasing a home.  I would really like to own my owned home some day.” 

Often, these programs not only provide down-payment assistance, but the city sells these homes to people with disabilities at below market rates.  “My contact with the city told me that these programs are totally under-enrolled.  Can you believe that?  “Down payment assistance, under market prices, and the program is under-enrolled!  That is my next goal, I have looked at a few houses and condominiums, but they were not what I wanted.”  Susan plans to keep looking—she is sure, with enough hard work, and continuing to take that next best step, she will find the right home for herself.  Knowing Susan, ATA is confident she will, someday soon, have that home of her own.