You Need More Money: Wake Up and Solve Your Financial Problems Once And For All - Hardcover

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Matt Manero is a serial entrepreneur and the CEO of four companies, including Commercial Fleet Financing, which made the Inc. 500 list of America's fastest-growing companies two years in a row. He hosts a syndicated radio show and podcast on the Lifestyle Talk Radio Network and speaks to audiences around the country. He lives with his wife and three sons in Dallas.

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Part I

The Wake-Up Call

Chapter 1

Your Money Mind-set Is Broken

It Can All Change in an Instant

When my brother-in-law, John, moved from Little Rock,Arkansas, to Dallas, Texas, with his wife and four children a few years ago, myfamily was thrilled. It allowed us all, my family of five, his family of six,and my mother-in-law—Gigi—to see each other a lot. Our favorite tradition wasEaster Sunday at Gigi’s house. She cooked, the children played football outsidetogether, and Gigi and my beloved wife, Rokki, were able to dote on John. Johnand Rokki are technically half brother and sister, but if you ever mentionedthat, they would both kick your ass. To say that Rokki, her sister Jeanelle,and Gigi were crazy in love with John would be an understatement. They werefiercely protective of him and worshipped the ground he walked on.

You see, life was always a little difficult for John. Hisbirth father never made an impact in his life and his adoptive father wasworthless. Gigi’s first husband, the father of John and his sister, Jeanelle,was nonexistent. After John was born, he was gone. When Gigi remarried, she andher new husband had Rokki. Rokki’s dad left the family when she was eleven andno one heard from him for three full years. After that divorce, Gigi remarriedagain to a “real winner,” who basically showed them the world of drinking,laziness, and negativity. My wife got away from it all at sixteen, when shemoved in with her best friend to finish high school with some structure, butthe impact of an absent father left John without a road map.

John did the best he could without any guidance. Highschool was a challenge, he never considered college, and he went into theworkforce underskilled. But through it all—his mother’s husbands, the lack offather figures, and any authority figures leaving their family—John was alwaysthere for the women in his life. Rokki, Jeanelle, and Gigi considered thatenough to earn 110 percent of their love, and they made sure John knew it everychance they could. In their eyes, he could do no wrong. And once again, if mywife, her sister, or her mom heard you criticize John, they would drop glovesand fight you on the spot. See, John’s financial situation was like chicken andfeathers: At times he was eating chicken, and at other times he was eatingfeathers. It was always an up-and-down situation, fueled by household moves,job changes, and the idea that the “next” job would be the home run.

On Easter Sunday in 2014, when John and his family cameto the door at Gigi’s, we all jumped up and shared hugs. The kids ran outsideand it had all the makings of another great Easter at Gigi’s house. But when Igot to John, he looked exhausted. His skin was pale and, without question, hehad dropped weight.

I hugged him and said, “Wow, John, you have lost someweight!”

“Maybe five pounds,” said John.

More like twenty to twenty-five pounds, I thought.

When dinner was served, I noticed that John hardlytouched his plate. Gigi always made a ton of food because of how much John andI would gulp down, but today he hardly ate a bite. It was odd, but we didn’tcomment much on it. After dinner, John and I hit the couch to watch the game.Within minutes John was asleep. I sat by his side, watching the game quietly.Around fifteen minutes later, John awoke suddenly, almost in a panic. His eyesshot wide open as he grabbed my arm and leaned over to me. He said in awhisper, “I haven’t felt worth a shit in months, but I’m going to the doctor inthe morning to get it checked out.”

That should have been that. My brother-in-law, loved byso many, especially his wife and four children, and considered superhuman by mywife, his sister, and his mother, should have simply gone to the doctor onMonday, gotten a shot, and gone back to work on Tuesday. But John wasn’t okay.The doctor he saw on Monday sent him straight to the emergency room. At ageforty-six, and—as we were soon to find out—with no health insurance, no lifeinsurance, and less than $100 in the bank, our beloved John was diagnosed withstage 4 cancer. Our lives, none of them, would ever be the same again.

The Difference Money Can Make

Normal can change in an instant. Firings, regulations,buyouts, mergers, or even a cancer diagnosis can occur without any of it beingyour fault. My brother-in-law had busted his butt for twenty years, had nothingto show for it, and was filled with guilt when he discovered he was dying. Foryears, he’d known that he needed more money to keep his family secure, but nowit was too late.

At this point in my life, I already had the wake-up callthat made me realize I needed more money. My brother-in-law’s stage 4 canceronly convinced me that I could never rest. I didn’t stop when I was doing okaybecause I knew it all could change in a minute—and it did. While this kind oftragedy showed me how a lack of money and preparation can cause havoc, on theother side, I saw the power that having money can make on a difficultsituation. The outpouring of emotional support from the community of Coppell,Texas, was incredible: people provided food, gifts, clothes, and even somecash. But when it came to ultimately helping with the money situation, whetherit was John’s past-due bills or the rent, Rokki and I were able to step in andtake care of it so John’s family could hold things together during hissickness. Being able to write checks without worrying about how it would affectmy family’s future is the greatest gift I have ever been fortunate enough togive.

Finding yourself in a situation like John’s would be devastating,but even less extreme circumstances can cause a major crisis. You want to be inthe spot where you don’t have to worry about what would happen if everything inyour life changed. Right now, you don’t have enough savings, enough wealth, andenough of a plan, and it’s finally time to admit it: you need more money.Acknowledging that is the first step to changing your financial situation, andyour life. If everything goes south tomorrow, you’re screwed. You don’t haveenough money saved, the college account for your children is underfunded, as isyour retirement account, and if just one little blip hits your financialsituation, it’s all going to come tumbling down. Would you be okay ifeverything changed? I doubt it. And it should keep you up at night, just likeit did for me.

I tell you this to make you understand two things. First,understand how quickly your financial situation can change. The vast majorityof things in this world are out of your control. You can’t control how newregulations will affect your business, the strength of new competitors, howreturns on the stock market will pay out, or even what health issues may arise.All of this means you need to focus harder on the one thing you can control:you need to get your money in order.

Second, you need to understand the power that money givesyou. I’m not talking about power for the sake of prestige or notoriety or fame.I’m talking about the power to lift the guilt from a dying man’s shoulders.When I saw that my brother-in-law was scared of dying and leaving his familywith nothing because he hadn’t gotten his finances into shape, my wife and Iwere able to step in because of our financial success and remove the burdenfrom his shoulders so he could focus on his recovery.

Chances are...