EP#44- Financial Wellness: Why You Should Start Investing with Eve Halimi & Anam Lakhani, Co-Founders of Alinea

(gentle music) A lot of the times what financial wellness and financial independence means is having the ability and the opportunities to do things you truly want to do. Welcome back to another episode of Everyday Endorphins. When we think of wellness, we often think of our physical wellness or our emotional wellness going to the gym. We know that it's important to stay active and stay in shape for our bodies and our minds, seeking therapy or other options to help in times of stress or feeling overwhelmed. That's taking care of our physical and our emotional wellness, but we often don't talk about financial wellness, especially young women. However, I've come to learn that financial wellness plays a really integral role in your overall wellbeing. So this week, I had the pleasure of bringing a non-Lakani and Eve Halimi, co-founders of Alina Invest, onto the podcast to talk all about investing and what financial wellness means. Alina Invest is a mobile investing app with a mission to empower the next generation of investors. I had the opportunity to help out with Alina while I was in college as part of their community coordinator program, so not only it was a great opportunity for me to learn more about investing, why you should invest your money, and what it means to be financially independent, but I was able to see what it's like from a startup perspective when you're building out something, when you're building out an app and idea, a company, all the work that goes into that. And I think it's super fascinating, all the work that they're doing and that they continue to do every day. So in this episode, we talk all about financial wellness, financial independence, how you can achieve financial wellness, through investing as one strategy, how you can invest on the Alina app, the mission behind the app, and what it was like for them to make a sacrifice, leaving their full-time job to fully pursue what they're doing with Alina. Before we get into the episode, I have a brief message for my sponsor, anchor. Hi, Annah, I'm Hi, Eve. Thank you so much for coming onto the podcast. We're super excited to be here and to finally chat. Thanks for having us. So something that's been on my mind recently is financial wellness. And it's actually been on my mind for a while, but I feel like now that I have a job and a lot of my friends are now in the working world. This is a concept that's become even more important and kind of like a smack in the face, understanding what is financial wellness. So I'd love to start there. How would you guys both define what financial wellness is? Yeah, so I mean, not too long ago, Stella, and still now we were in your shoes. I think really I came back from a Wall Street internship and it was the first time in my life where I had a little bit of cash left over and I knew I wanted to do something with it apart from just leaving in a savings account or go shopping. I wanted to see that money grow and I know Eve was in the same position. And I think that's when it really hits you. And I think financial wellness is just making sure you have opportunities available to you. And obviously one way to do that is, obviously the first steps for creating an emergency fine, making sure you've paid off your debt, but another whole part of that is investing. And that was something even I are really passionate about. Yeah, and to add on to that, I think financial wellness also means you personally taking care and being financially independent, right? A lot of the time I'll speak to young people who are in college or out of college and still letting their parents or their boyfriends or their own goals or fathers take care of their finances. And it's not about that to be financially independent. It's to be able to do it yourself. And that's what we stand for at Elinio. I think also once you're financially independent and you can afford the lifestyle that you want to lead, it's that much more rewarding. But when you're coming out of college, it's really scary for the first time, like not really knowing how to manage your finances. And I loved your comment and I'm about having this sum of money and not really knowing what to do with it, not necessarily wanting it to sit in a savings account. And that's where investing comes into play. And not long ago, the both of you founded your own investing platform called Elinio Invest. And I had the opportunity to get involved as a community coordinator when I was still in college, which I absolutely loved. I think in that program, I was able to gain more exposure to what investing is and have conversations with other people my age and other women my age about investing in the gender gap and investing. It was so good having you on. And I think we originally bonded about this conversation of financial wellness and what that means. And it's really incredible every day. We get to talk to college students, those struggles and fears that are experiencing, especially related to investing. And I think we still really see a lot of interest, but also a lot of feelings of just being nervous, being scared, being afraid to get started. And so at Elinio, we're just really working at how do you kind of overcome that and how do you get started. And I think investing like any other skill in life is something that comes with time and practice. And so the best way to do it is just get started, whether that's with $5, $10 or 20. It's just it's about taking that first step. - I agree. It is difficult to get started. And I think back when we met, like I guess a year ago now, I remember sharing with you that I had first found out about investing from a male friend about Robinhood. And these were not conversations I was having with my other friends who were girls. None of us were talking about it. And I know at Elinio, that's also something that's super valuable to the both of you is like closing the gender gap and investing. But it seems now you're also pivoting more to focusing on how do people actually get started with investing? - I think it's both. So there's basically, there are people who are comfortable with investing, who are super technical, who like to kind of be more risk takers. And then there's the majority of the population who are risk overs, who are overwhelmed. It goes across genders. Women you definitely see it more because those just, they're not conversations we're having and we should be having them. I don't think we talk about it as much, but that's going to change, hopefully. And so it's really about just like how do you get started and take the intimidation out? And how do you bring in people who have been left behind or who aren't exposed in having this conversation? And so Elinio just beyond the platform as a brand, as a startup, as female founders, we want to make sure people who feel overwhelmed or feel left behind or feel like this isn't something for them, don't feel that way anymore. And they can get started. - It's very difficult, especially when there aren't those conversations being had, but over the past year, like even more, most recently, you guys have been doing such amazing jobs at spreading the word about Elinio and also really emphasizing how it's not that hard to get started with investing. How all you need really is just a little bit of money, just put it in there. And through the growth of the Elinio community and getting other people to talk about investing, that's how you can also increase your financial or personal financial literacy. And I know that you guys recently rolled out a new feature called Stacks. Could you talk a little bit more about what the Stacks feature is, how it relates to the platform and how it ultimately can help people get started in investing. - When Nanamana came out of these Wall Street internships and we're seeing a lot of our male friends out of Gamble on the Stockmark gave, we wanted to create at that point an alternative to Robin Hood that was much more responsible. And that's where the Stacks play in, right? The Stacks are ETFs that are rebranded, but more than anything, they're an amazing way to diversify your portfolio. We want to create a product for the next generation to be able to invest in causes they care about, but also diversify at the same time. And that's what we kind of separated on the app. We have impact stocks where people can invest in clean energy, they can invest in woman led companies all in one click. And that's the beauty of it. - From what I've seen on the platform, it's very user friendly. So when you're looking at the interface and you're looking at the Stacks, not only is it user friendly, but it's also really fun to see what options you can put in your stack. And at the end of the day, when you're able to share that, see what your friends are investing in, I think that also increases that sense of community. So hopefully people are buying into this idea of like understanding how to invest in what their friends are doing and bringing more of a social aspect into it as well. - Yeah, I think it's really about moving past, we're in retail investing 2.0, which means we've moved from those very traditional brokerages to now mobile apps, which is great. People are doing this on their phone, which was unheard of like 10 years ago. That wasn't even a thing. I think now we're at the next phase of it is, okay, as what can we do next, right? So Stacks, that's one click and you're invested in 100,000. thousands of companies with that. You can see what your friends are doing, what stacks they're making. You may trust one of your friends who's very into clean energy. And they've done their homework, they've made a clean energy stack. And you can actually have the ability to invest in that. And that hasn't been done before. So we're super excited to release these features and just take investing to the next level and just really give a different experience than what's out there. I mean, also, Alina's growth has really accelerated over the past like a few months especially. Every time I've checked LinkedIn or Instagram, there's just a new achievement that Alina has met. And it's really aspirational that both of you left your full-time jobs to pursue this. I'd love for you to talk a little bit more about what that shift was like now being full-time entrepreneurs, working in this industry, being your own boss is essentially, I mean, going through rounds of funding, it's a lot going on and you're working to develop this app and make it as best as it can be. So I'd love for you to speak a little bit more about like that transition and just jumping into this new lifestyle. So we're not our own boss, the customers are our boss. And we're working with our customers. And I think that's the most rewarding part of this. OK, so one of my sister's friends had never invested before. She's not an econ or finance student. And we got her on the app and today she sent me a text and said, "I feel like I can really invest now and I've learned so much and thank you." And I think those moments are just the most rewarding for us. Entrepreneurship is very interesting. I think a lot of the times we get asked about, why would you take this risk and quit your cushy job? And I think-- and I heard this in a different podcast, but it's like for entrepreneurs, it's so much riskier to not take this on because you have such a strong conviction that this product is needed in the world. And that's something even I definitely felt. I mean, when you start at Paul Raham has a quote, which I love. I am not saying it exactly right, but he says, like, when you start thinking about an idea every day in the shower and you can stop thinking about it, you have to go and pursue it. And that I think, I'm going to write after graduating. We started our full-time jobs, but we just couldn't stop thinking about an idea and how much we wanted to create this product, how much we wanted to create this startup and really see it come through. And so, yeah, I don't think we will ever look back. And even our team, like all of our engineers, they're all from Columbia, they're Gen Z's. They've experienced this problem. And so this product is literally four Gen Z's, by Gen Z's. And we're also passionate about it. So it's actually really fun. And we're excited to just, every time, like, deliver a new feature or talk to our customers, we're learning so much along the way. Yeah, if you have that drive for it, it has to, like, propel you through it. Because being an entrepreneur and starting your own thing is really exhausting. And especially, I can't imagine that transition when you did decide to make the leap. Your lifestyle changed. Your daily schedule changed. How did you manage maybe the stresses that came with not being in a traditional, corporate environment and having to make your own schedule adopt a whole new working strategy? What was that like for the both of you? It was so weird at the beginning. It was funny because at the beginning, I still remember, and I put her job two weeks before me. And she was just like, I keep you here. This is such a weird transition. It was a very uncomfortable transition. I think people don't talk about this as much. But I remember when I was walking toward, I almost felt like it's such a bad analogy. But you know, you're lost pet almost. You don't know what you're doing. You're just like, wow. It's very uncomfortable. So you have to create this new structure for yourself. You have to create this day-to-day-- this daily structure, which you usually had at your job with your manager and your team. And now you're managing yourself and you're managing people and you're just like, whoa, how do I create a structure? And no one really tells you how to do it. So it is definitely a transition. It's quite counterintuitive. So you kind of have a startup. So you kind of are moving out a corporate structure. But you really need a lot of what makes a startup work is process and structure. And so it's really interesting. And you have to hit some level of self-awareness to create this process and structure for yourself. So for example, even I do not come from engineering backgrounds and shout out Dan or CTO. One of the most incredible things he's done is create an engineering process, which I had no idea how that works. But he's really set up, you know, things meetings that work for us very effective times where we discuss product review sessions. So yeah, you still need structure, but you also still need time to kind of think, bring, storm, be creative. And that's the fun of startups. You have to balance all of that. The structure that's put in place. But now in the startup world, you have to manage the entirety of the startup, the company that you're building. But how do you find time to manage yourself in your personal life? Seems like the two can be very blend and intertwined when your entire life becomes your work. It's very difficult to manage both. It's very hard to have a social life plus a sort of life. When I finished my work week in my previous job, I was looking forward to the weekends, right? OK, all I wanted to do was go out to brunch with my friends, go out on a Saturday night, go to a party. And now I would rather sit at home or sit with the team and work than go out to a party. So yeah, your interests kind of shift. And that's totally fine. We still make time for obviously for our own personal needs and to see our friends and our family. But it definitely isn't the same. I want to pivot a little bit and talk more about the different components of financial wellness. Obviously, you and a nom are very focused on the investing aspect of it with Alinea. But earlier, a nom was mentioning that it's very multifaceted. Your savings account, your investments in your retirement. So what are the different components really of financial wellness to be financially independent? As soon as you start making your first paycheck, and I tell this to everyone, you should be putting about 20% of that paycheck into investing it essentially. Because if you're not investing some of that paycheck, you're letting money kind of stand still. I really break this down when you start getting your first salary because that's how I kind of see it. That's when you can become financially independent when you're in college. It's very difficult. But you should have about 30% of your paycheck or less in your rent in New York City. That's very tough. I think for my first job, I had like 70% on my first initial paycheck in my rent. It was a disaster for my financial advice. So yeah, you should have about 30% in your rent, 20% invested, and about 30% to 40% into food and so on. And so you should actually just taking a step back. You should have about 30% saved as well. And like an emergency fund or saved in retirement, like how do you break that down? I would put 15% in retirement and about 15% just sitting in cash as a saving. Ideally, when you're financially independent, financially well, you really want to feel comfortable with your finances. So again, it's not splurging on shopping. It's not splurging on rents. You have to really break down how you're going to spend that first paycheck. And it's different for everyone. Unfortunately, even though there's like rules out there, like save 20% of your income, it is different for everyone. And everyone has a different financial situation. And that's why it's really hard to prescribe something. But you have to consciously and actively make the effort to put saving to the side, to put investing to the side, because time catches up with you sooner than you know. And I think what most people don't understand is people assume investing is risky. And it's better to leave things in a savings account. But what a lot of Gen Zs also don't consider is leaving things in a saving account, like leaving money in a savings account is more risky because inflation is going to catch up with that. And the value of your money will decrease if you can leave it in a savings account. Whereas if you invest it in something like the S&P 500, which has averaged a 7% return per year, for you know, past, I don't know, at the numbers like 40 years or so, that's where your money is growing. And that's actually the safer and better alternative. That's a great point, because I think a lot of my peers and people my age who are not super well versed with investing or don't have a lot of knowledge about investing, think that you're putting all your money in, let's say, like one individual stock, and they don't know how to choose like the right stock where they'll get. positive returns. And I think mentioning the S&P 500 is a great example of something that's more stable and not as risky because you are guaranteed to make, you know, to grow from that investment. And there's other kinds of investments as well where you can make your money back and grow it in the long term. Another investment that seems, I think, right now kind of risky is with NFTs and blockchain. I don't know if either of you want to speak to that. I think it's a very interesting space. It's definitely like when you're a beginner you don't want to start by buying an NFT. It's probably not the safest or most comfortable way to go. NFTs basically like buying a collectible or piece that's digital and so before you kind of get into that, I think the objective for many beginners is to kind of establish steady income that you're going to get from investing. Investing in a stack is a great way to go, right? Because you're diversifying your portfolio from the get go, you're reducing risk. Can you define what it means to diversify a portfolio for some of my listeners who may not know what that means? That basically means like it's a saying don't put your eggs all in one basket. So what you're not doing is you're not putting all your eggs in one basket. You're distributing that amongst different stocks or different asset classes. So your risk is ultimately reduced because you're not betting on one company performing well. Very risky to put all your money into Tesla or all your money into Dogecoin. That is too avoid. And that is what we saw a lot of our friends lose a lot of money that way and that's why it's very important to invest in stocks to help you invest in multiple things at the same time. Like the S&P 500 is one of the best places to keep your money. It's the top biggest 500 public companies in the US. Noted. Good advice. I think yeah again back to the earlier point. People I think feel that as if investing can be risky because their understanding of investing is putting all their eggs in one basket, putting all their money in a Tesla stock or in Amazon or whatever. And that's not really the best investment strategy because it's really risky. More so than maybe buying an NFT. I mean there are cases where people now are just making so much money off of buying NFTs and haven't really ever invested before because they're maybe they're at the right time, you know, right place, right time, that type of thing. No, 100%. And for blockchain and crypto, we don't have crypto on the platform yet. However, a lot like a great way to get exposure to blockchain and crypto companies is the blockchain stack. So that basically offers, you know, a variety of companies that are working on the blockchain space that are working with blockchain technologies. And you can kind of get the same sort of exposure to that space without having to actually invest in crypto, which I think is pretty interesting for people who are skeptical or who are more risk-versed about crypto. I saw that recently roll out. So I think that's a really a really great addition. And I'll have to check that out for sure because I'm kind of dabbling a little bit in the whole crypto world without really a firm understanding. But I have a few friends that are very enthusiastic about crypto blockchain, NFTs, Ethereum, all of that good stuff. But going back to, you know, the central idea and the central theme around financial well, well-being and wellness. There's this quote that like everybody knows, you know, money can't buy happiness. And I've thought a lot about that quote, especially with the topic of today's conversation. And my personal thinking has kind of shifted around that. And I'm curious to hear your perspectives on this idea between, and the relationship between money and happiness and well-being, given that we've just talked a lot about financial wellness and what it means to be financially independent. I think a lot of the times what financial wellness and financial independence means is having the ability and the opportunities to do things you truly want to do. Whether that's pursuing the hobby or whether that's, you know, being able to afford opportunities for yourself. I think that's truly financial wellness. And I think out of the entire wellness industry, we focus a lot on physical wellness and mental and emotional wellness. But financial wellness does correlate with that highly. And so I think it's definitely something, of course, money can't buy you happiness. But I can't afford you opportunities. I can't afford you security. I think a lot of students know that we're sort of in like the highest levels of student debt we've seen. We're in. I know a lot of first-generation college students know that. People who have immigrant parents. And so you kind of see like, our parents didn't necessarily have certain opportunities. And being able to afford opportunities is very important. And that's why you should be focusing on your financial wellness and financial independence from a young age. I think that's a great way to talk about the distinction between this concept around money not buying happiness and really what financial independence and what financial wellness means. At the end of the day, you want to be smart about how you, you know, spend your money and how you, you know, your personal finances so that you can at least live comfortably. Whatever that definition is for you. Because at the end of the day, everything in life costs money. Like nothing is for free. So I think that's also important to to keep in mind. And we're at a really interesting point in history if you think about it. Like investing was originally only created for wealthy people or institutional investors. We've now moved to anyone who has a mobile phone, has access to investing. And they're still like massive like demographic, you know, gaps here. I think I read today. You have Americans still don't own any piece of the stock market. They don't own any stocks. If you look at women, the gender investing gap is still enormous. It costs, I think around average, like a million dollars in a woman's lifetime, woman live longer, minority groups as well. Many minority groups are not owning any equities. And so I think we're at a really interesting point in history. And definitely our mission at Alinea is to bring those people who have been left behind. And to make this more accessible to them and make it more familiar and make them feel more content as investors. That's great. I mean, I love what you guys are doing. And I'm curious to know in the next five years, what do you hope for Alinea to achieve? It's a loaded question, but I'm sure you have like a five year plan. You know, we went to a college campus. I think a week ago. And so many students came up to us and they said, we're so, we're interested in investing, but we're so scared. And we don't know where to start. And I hope in five years when we go back, people come up to us and say, you know, I started investing. It was because of the Alinea app started right when I got to college and we're building wealth. And I think that would be yeah, incredible. I really hope we get more women, more minorities to join the investing, space that we we kind of break the gender investing out a bit more. And yeah, that we educate people on financial literacy. That's a huge one. And we're also shifting to a different thing. I think people are more selective with what they're investing in. It's almost as if you're voting with your dollars, like you're literally putting your money where your mouth is. And so I think investing can also be a form of self-expression. And that's what we're definitely seeing with the next generation. People want financial returns, but they don't want it at the cost of compromising their values. So we're really excited to see where that goes. And I think it's like, whether it's like fashion or art, I think we're seeing investing become a form of self-expression as well. That's a really unique way to put it. I like that because I haven't thought of it that way. But I think that really captures the essence of what you're trying to do with Alinea and how you're trying to get people my age, Gen Z, people who are hesitant to investing to really think about it in a different way, in a way that is accessible and appealing to them. So keep up the amazing work. It's just so awesome to see what you guys keep doing. And all the amazing things that you've achieved up to this point and will continue to do. One final question that I have for the both of you is what is something that brings you in doorfins? Working with you that every day. That's too easy to even answer. Honestly, working up a knob is like working with a fitness coach. Constantly motivating. Constantly motivating and pushing you to work harder. I think doing what you love, that's in your friends' chocolate. We eat too much love here. I don't know if that's recommended, but honestly, there's nothing more exciting and exhilarating than working on your own passion project. A startup is a full-of-roll opposed to it. But when the highs are high, it really kicks in. No, but I think building and innovating is such a beautiful process. I don't know. You're not always exposed to that. Actually, I have it. It's when customers send us really loving messages saying that they learn something you want to linear. That really. I love that. I mean, if you have happy customers because you're doing something right, which clearly are because lots of great feedback has come your way. Thank you guys so much for coming on to the podcast. Thank you for having us. Thank you for always supporting us. Do the best. [MUSIC PLAYING] Thank you for listening and remember to like, rate, and review this podcast on whichever listening platform you prefer. Don't forget to keep spreading in Dorfins and find things that bring you in Dorfins every day. See you next time. [MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC PLAYING]