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- [00:01]
A
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- [01:51]
B
So let me ask you this switching gears but also important conversation when it comes to wealth. I know you know, in your life everybody has challenges. You went through a divorce. Oh yeah. So talk about how you can navigate keeping your wealth after a divorce. I love that, you know. And Rashad, that's a book I actually want to write. It's like how to Become a Millionaire After Divorce because, you know, divorce wipes out people financially. It's a complete reset. And you know, I went through a divorce, you know, kind of at a worse time, at a worst time when, you know, my business was in 2002, 2003 was the big.combust and I was into consulting big. I used to work for Deloitte and Ernst and Young and I and I was on my own at that time and clients didn't want to see a consultant after Y2K they're like, we're tired of spending all this money on advice. And you know, Y2K wasn't as big as it was and the dot com isn't as big as it was supposed to be. So business was tough. I mean, 2002, 2003, and I was in red ink. And that was the same time my ex wife, the. My, my son's mothers and I decide to go our separate ways and, and I was left with a half a million dollars in debt from, with Wells Fargo Bank. My line of credit was called because I was using my line of credit to keep the business afloat. And so, you know, so if you get in a situation, you find yourself getting divorced, I think the first thing that you have to really do is kind of focus on your offense, focus on keeping your income strong, focus on your skills. And then also you have to be steady about what you do with your money because now you have less money to do. And for, for me, I had to stop paying for my son's college funds, you know, for a few years until I re sorted out my finances, right? And my divorce, you know, caused me to sell my big house in, in Oakland Hills and pretty much give her all the proceeds. But I kept my apartment buildings. So if you have multiple assets in your family, what I did with my ex wife, I was like, okay, we've got this, we have this equity in our house. I'm buying out my apartment buildings, the ones I had in Jersey city back in 2003 and in D.C. right? So I bought her out of those and held onto those. And there was a year when I couldn't even pay myself. So. So people think I got a job and I get a divorce, and that's bad. But think about being an entrepreneur, getting a divorce, having to split up half of your assets and having to pay alimony and child support and trying to figure out your life moving forward. But what was really helpful, Troy is about, was the fact that I kept a frugal mindset and I was really responsible in doing what I was supposed to do to my ex wife and my kids. So I kept a frugal mindset and I just went low to the ground, man. People wouldn't have known it, but I was not spending money on clothes, I wasn't spending money on anything. But I held onto my investments. And in fact, I figured out a way to convest more because I had assets. So my advice to people going through that is to develop this frugal mindset. You'll lay Low and keep moving forward, keep investing your way, and in time, you'll see your way out of it. And so. And so that's really, really key. And one of the things, like I said, that worked for me was buying real estate in Jersey City in 2003. And if you guys live in New York and know what's happened with Jersey City, it's exploded, it's booming, it's booting, it's booming. So it's a matter of basically make sure you take care of responsibility, make sure you do what you have to do, Continue to invest, continue to work on your income, and you'll dig your way out of it. But too many people look at divorce as saying, I don't want to make no more money, because if I do, she's going to hit me up for more child support. I'm like, don't punk out. Just, you know, be responsible. Do what you have to do, but get busy on your offense. Get busy building up your income and continue to invest. And although it may not feel like this, 10, 15, 20 years down the road, like Steve Jobs, connecting the dots, looking forward to, you'll see that it worked out. My three boys graduated college. One of them got his MBA in finance. You know, we have a great relationship. My net worth is. Is gone up probably, you know, probably 15, 20 times since then, because I didn't give up. And that's really what it's all about. What about the prenup? Oh, yeah. Well, I hate to air my dirty laundry, but I've been married twice. But anyway, so the first time I did that. You got divorced twice. I got divorced twice. That's the next. That's the next book. Yeah. I've been divorced twice. You know, which is interesting, Rashad, because my second wife, her and I were really still good friends. She worked at my company for a lot of years. She's. She's a lawyer. And what was interesting about is that we came into the. Into the marriage unequally financially yoked, which was challenging. Right. My net worth is here. She was, you know, she was about 10 years younger than me, and she.
- [06:53]
A
Well, can you raise your hand a little higher? We're under the screen.
- [06:56]
B
Oh, thanks. My net worth was here and hers was down here. So in the prenup, you know, which. That started that set the relationship off. The wrong foot. Right. Huh.
- [07:10]
A
The prenup or the imbalance, which it.
- [07:13]
B
Often does, even though women say, well, I'll gladly sign a prenup, that's no problem. Okay, well, I didn't really know what a prenup was. A lot of people don't know what it really is. So I went and hired an attorney through my recommendations, and my attorney was putting my prenup together, and we were getting married, and he was running behind on getting it done. So it was kind of forcing some pressure there. So by the time he delivered prenup and her attorney reviewed it, she was like. She felt like she. She really couldn't trust me anymore. She already had doubts anyway, but she really felt like she couldn't trust me. Because what a prenup is, is when you get married, there are inalienable rights to a marriage that the state gives you right. And so when you get a prenup, what it's saying is, I'm waiving my right to this, his income. I'm waiving my rights to this, his assets. I'm waiving my rights to all these things. And you're like, wait a minute. It feels awkward. It's like, I have a right for that, and then now I'm giving it away. So a lot of people. It kind of blows their mind, Even though there are concessions that says, well, if we got a divorce by this time, you would get this. But, hey, you're a lawyer. You make good money. It's like, you know, and you have a child, and I got three boys. So it was very, very difficult. And the moment that we signed it, which was, like, it was supposed to not be through duress, but it ended up being kind of through duress because she waited till the last minute right before we got married. It just put the marriage on the wrong foot. So after dating for 10 years and being married for five years, we ended up calling it quits. And my prenup, you know, it helped. And so what's interesting is about the prenup is, like, a lot of people say they want it until they read it, and they have their lawyers give them feedback, and it's difficult. Then her lawyer wanted to. Right. Her lawyer wanted to write my prenup. After that, she was like, oh, no, let me rewrite it. I was like, no, you can't write a prenup to protect my assets. Right? Yeah, I'm not gonna go for that. So it's very complicated, and a lot of people struggle with that notion. But look at it this way. I don't know if you. I mean, I know you guys have one son or kid, and I know Troy, you have two, three kids. I was thinking, like, I can't get a divorce. You have Two kids. Okay. I'm sorry. Listen, man.
- [09:35]
A
Yeah, we married, man. I'm just trying to stay in this lady.
- [09:38]
B
Right, right. Just two. But the whole point is, like, if I got a divorce from my second wife and I. Because I had a will, too, because if I died, she was. I was going to give her 25% of my assets. The other 75% was going to my sons. But if I died and my assets went to her without a prenup, then my sons could have had a situation where she wouldn't have paid for their college. Yeah. My sons could have been in a situation where they've got nothing. So my rationale for a prenup was, you know, my sons are everything to me. There's no way in the world I'm gonna work this hard and not like my dad say, have them start from my shoulders. Yep. Not from the ground. So I needed to make sure that they were taken care of. And that was the crux of the. Of the prenup. What was interesting is there's three sides of a prenup. There's my. I'm making sure my hands on the camera. There's my assets, her assets, and ours. And so how it goes is my assets could continue to grow. Right. And I would still own them as long as they were. They were. They were titled to me. And then her assets would do the same thing. Right. She had a condo that would continue to grow, but if we titled assets together, that's what we would split, and that's how it was written. So we never really had any assets together. So therefore, when we got a divorce, I kept my assets, she kept hers, and I entered the concession part of my. Of my. Of my prenup. But it's an interesting thing, and it really sometimes damages relationships because people start looking at you like, do you trust me? Or whatever. We end up divorced. We end up good friends. She stayed in my company for a lot of years. She's now a tech lawyer for major government contracting businesses. Because she worked in my business, and I raised her daughter like my daughter. So it's all good, but that's the challenge.