CO-HOST | Make Money with a Tier List: Ranking Financial Influencers

Summary

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Travis Makes Money – "Make Money with a Tier List: Ranking Financial Influencers"

Host: Travis Chappell
Guests: Eric (Producer), Kim (occasional input)
Episode Date: May 18, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this dynamic and entertaining episode, Travis Chappell and his producer Eric take a fresh approach to evaluating the most prominent financial influencers by creating a "Tier List"—a ranking system borrowed from gaming and internet culture. Their playful but critical discussion focuses on how effective, balanced, and trustworthy each influencer's financial advice is, as well as their broader impact on personal finance culture.

Key takeaways include thoughtful commentary on real estate, investing, entrepreneurship, financial media bias, and the potential pitfalls of influencer-driven advice. Travis and Eric blend humor with genuine critique, making this a lively yet valuable listen for anyone seeking direction in today's crowded financial content landscape.

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How the Tier List Works

Tiers:

• S: Supreme / best of the best
• A: Excellent
• B: Above average
• C: Average / some issues
• D: Below average
• F: Off the list

Eric gives a quick, humorous rundown of this ranking system, poking fun at generational divides:

• "So S tier is like supreme, superior. The best, goated. ABCD is like school." — Eric [02:00]

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Deep Dive: Who Made the List and Why

Real Estate and Investment Focused Influencers

Brandon Turner

• Placement: A Tier
• Rationale: Highly knowledgeable and successful in real estate, but too niche for general wealth advice.
  • “His specialty is real estate...if you’re going to put money in real estate, you gotta learn about real estate.” — Travis [02:26]
• Insight: Even passive real estate investment requires education; there are risks if you blindly follow.

Graham Stephan

• Placement: S Tier (the only one!)
• Rationale: Brings a uniquely balanced approach, with hands-on success in both real estate and stock markets.
  • “I would put him at S tier because of his balanced approach to finances... not just somebody who specializes in this one thing.” — Travis [06:00]
• Memorable Moment: Travis emphasizes the value of learning from people who’ve actually practiced what they preach in different arenas.
  • “Now, honestly, having met him, it adds to it because I genuinely just think he’s a good dude and he’s doing it for the right reasons.” — Travis [24:18]

Robert Kiyosaki (Rich Dad, Poor Dad)

• Placement: C Tier
• Rationale: Seminal book, but his current persona and content give off “sketchy” vibes.
  • “If I were ranking 'Rich Dad, Poor Dad' as a financial book, I would put it higher…but him as a person to continually follow… now, a lot of the stuff he does for cash grab stuff.” — Travis [10:05]
• Memorable Moment: Discussion of a controversial clip where Kiyosaki laughs about evicting a family at Christmas (played on air), solidifying his lower ranking.
  • “That’s a crazy…not a good look.” — Travis [09:35]

Grant Cardone

• Placement: B Tier (after consideration between C/B)
• Rationale: Big on sales and real estate, but “polarizing” and highly self-interested in promoting his funds.
  • “All of his content goes into selling that product…His advice should be taken with a grain of salt.” — Travis [13:51]
• Quote: “He seems like one of those sketchy Internet characters…and to be fair, he is the ultimate target for some of these government agencies and still came out pretty clean.” — Travis [11:55]
• Notable Moment: Recap of a public apology won by Cardone in a defamation case:
  “I apologize to Mr. Cardone, his wife Elena Cardone…partners, investors and any person who may have been influenced by my statements...” — Eric, reading John Legere's apology [15:19]

Classic Personal Finance Gurus

Dave Ramsey

• Placement: A Tier
• Rationale: Enormous respect for impact and clarity, but “never ever use debt” is too rigid.
  • “Fantastic…phenomenal guy. Built an amazing business. Have nothing but respect. But I cannot get on board for like, never ever use debt.” — Travis [21:40]
• Insight: Ramsey is great as a financial “gateway drug” for beginners in trouble, but isn’t flexible enough for advanced or nuanced situations.

George Kamel & Rachel Cruze (Ramsey Personalities)

• George Kamel: A Tier (similar to Dave Ramsey)
• Rachel Cruze: B Tier (Travis hasn’t engaged much with her content, prefers George’s “comedy and personality.”)
  • “It sounds like she seems very much like George...I like George’s personality.” — Travis [05:15]

Ramit Sethi

• Placement: A Tier
• Rationale: Positive impression, but Travis hasn't read his book, so can't go full S.
  • “I like his stuff a lot, actually...I’ll throw him in A tier as well.” — Travis [04:33]

Emerging/Controversial Personal Finance Voices

Caleb Hammer

• Placement: B Tier (debated)
• Controversy: Criticized for being “edgelord” and making fun of guests, sometimes misogynistic.
  • “I did like him but…he’s super misogynist...his titles are crazy...” — Eric [17:03]
  • “Well...does that need to be A tier? ...Let’s put him B tier.” — Travis [17:27]

Vivian Tu (Your Rich BFF)

• Placement: B Tier
• Reason: Not enough content consumed by Travis to rate higher, but appears helpful to general personal finance audience.

Cody Sanchez

• Placement: B/C Tier (ultimately B)
• Critique: Focuses on entrepreneurship advice, not suitable for most people. Risk of oversimplifying business acquisition.
  • “It just requires a lot more skill...than I think her content implies.” — Travis [19:07]
  • “If you are the average person, it’s probably not the best thing to follow.” — Travis [21:05]

Notable “Non-Contenders”: Financial Internet Grifters / Manosphere

• Eric attempts to add a notorious “TikTok Manosphere” influencer as a joke. Travis scores him “F tier,” i.e., not even deserving mention.
  • “If there’s an F tier…he shouldn’t even be...just not on the list. Gone completely from the world.” — Travis [25:01]

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Major Takeaways & Closing Insights

• Bias in Financial Advice:
  • “Just because somebody is gaining something financially from their advice does not mean that their advice is incorrect. But you should interrogate the advice a little bit more and ask a couple more questions.” — Travis [23:37]
• Don’t Treat Influencers Like Gurus:
  • “Do not treat men like gods. Do not look at anybody as they're the ultimate source of truth, or you'll find yourself, I think, hurting.” — Travis [14:32]
• Different Strategies for Different People:
  • “Dave’s help to get you out of that terrible financial situation...but I just cannot get on board for never, ever have a credit card.” — Travis [21:40]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Introduction to Tier List Concept & Humor: [01:10]
• Brandon Turner (Real Estate): [02:19]
• Ramsey Personalities (George, Rachel): [03:27, 04:53]
• Ramit Sethi: [04:31]
• Graham Stephan (S tier & Why): [05:35, 24:18]
• Robert Kiyosaki (Book vs. Persona, eviction story): [06:47–09:41]
• Grant Cardone (Funds, controversy, apology): [10:59–16:24]
• Caleb Hammer (controversy): [16:29–17:36]
• Vivian Tu & Cody Sanchez (Nuanced takes): [17:46–21:19]
• Dave Ramsey (the “gateway drug” of finance): [21:19–23:24]
• Influencer Bias & Not treating anyone as a “god” of finance: [14:32, 23:37]
• Joking F-Tier addition (Manosphere TikToker): [24:44–25:29]

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Memorable Quotes

• "Take some of that stuff with a grain of salt...don't look at anybody as they're the ultimate source of truth." – Travis [14:32]
• "If you are the average person, [buying a business] is probably not the best thing to follow." – Travis (on Cody Sanchez) [21:05]
• "Just because somebody is gaining something financially from their advice does not mean that their advice is incorrect. It does mean that you should interrogate the advice a little bit more." – Travis [23:37]
• "Graham Stephan is the clear winner. He's S tier." – Eric [23:24]

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Episode Tone & Language

High-energy, light-hearted, with friendly back-and-forth between Travis and Eric. They blend sincere admiration for certain personalities with honest skepticism about influencer-driven finance. Occasionally, they dip into playful sarcasm and meme culture, but foundational advice—be skeptical, be self-aware—remains clear.

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Final Thoughts

This episode is both a fun ride through the personalities of MoneyTok and FinTwit and a subtle masterclass in how to evaluate who you get your advice from. While Travis ultimately crowns Graham Stephan as the top balanced and trustworthy financial influencer, he urges everyone to think critically, recognize biases, and never treat any one source as infallible.

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Transcript

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[Travis]

You're listening to the Travis Makes Money podcast presented by GoHighLevel.com for a free 30 day trial of the best all in one digital marketing software tool on the planet, just go to gohighlevel.com travis. What's going on, everybody? Welcome back to the Travis Makes Money podcast where it's mission to help you make more money this episode of the show. My producer Eric is in studio. What's up, man?

[Eric]

Hey. We don't have much time. We gotta get right into this episode. Cause we got. It's a meaty episode today, I'll tell you that one. All right, well, we. This show is about making money.

[Travis]

Yeah.

[Eric]

There's a lot of people on the Internet that tell you how to do it. I have a tier list of financial influencers.

[Travis]

Ooh.

[Eric]

And I want you to tell me where they go on the list. So spicy. First and foremost.

[Travis]

First of all, can you explain this tier list?

[Eric]

I knew. I knew exactly that you were going to say that.

[Travis]

Yeah, well, did you?

[Eric]

So because you're not Gen Z, you're millennial, you're like, why is there an S above the A? What does that mean?

[Travis]

Explain it.

[Eric]

That was Jim Gaffigan.

[Travis]

I don't understand why the S is there.

[Eric]

The Alphabet doesn't start there. It's pretty good, actually. That might be my best impression.

[Travis]

That's pretty good. Maybe you just decided that right now.

[Eric]

Why is he doing impressions of me? I met the Pope. All right, so anyway, that's good. See, it's a character, too. I learned that from John D. Domenico. You got to make it a character.

[Travis]

That's true.

[Eric]

All right, so here's how tier lists work, Boomer. So S tier is like supreme, superior. The best goated ABCD is like school.

[Travis]

Yeah, but why not just have it A, B, C, D?

[Eric]

Because that's not how it works. All right, so here we go. First up, Brandon Turner. I'll tell you one thing, guy's got some big pockets, right?

[Travis]

Totally. Although he hasn't been with them for like six years, but.

[Eric]

Well, now he's doing his own thing. Yeah, he took a turn.

[Travis]

I like bran a lot. I would. I would put him a tier because. Because his specialty is real estate. So if you do not want to learn how to be a real estate investor and you want to learn how to grow and protect your wealth, then he's probably not the guy that you want to follow because all of his stuff is about real estate, which he's very, very good at and has done very, very well with and makes a lot of great arguments for that being the thing that you should grow your wealth and preserve your wealth with. But if that is not your cup of tea again, because, like, if you're going to put money in real estate, you got to learn about real estate. It's not. You can't. There's no version of, like, the s and P500 in real estate. Even if you're going to be like, hey, I'll set it and forget it. Put money in this fund or this syndication, you still want to know some things about it to decide whether or not this is a good fund or syndication to write the check to. So there's still dangers, even in the quote unquote, passive world of real estate investing. So, yeah, I would put them a tier for real estate. He's one of my favorites, though.

[Eric]

Yeah. All right, what about George Camel, friend of the show?

[Travis]

George Camel has been on the show. He's a Ramsey personality. For that reason, I would put him.

[Eric]

For what reason? That he works with Dave Ramsey.

[Travis]

Yeah, that he's a Ramseyite.

[Eric]

That's dangerous to use that to contribute to your ranking. Because I also have other Ramseyites here.

[Travis]

Well, there's going to be probably similar rankings for Ramseyites.

[Eric]

Interesting. Okay, where do you put George Camel?

[Travis]

I would put him at a tier as well.

[Eric]

At what tier?

[Travis]

Don't do this.

[Eric]

Wait, which is.

[Travis]

Who's on first?

[Eric]

No, you said add a tier. Play it back. No, you said a tier.

[Travis]

I said a. I said I would put him at a tier.

[Eric]

Listen, if you're listening, click the 15 second. But you said, I'm going to put him at a tier as well.

[Travis]

No, I did not. I said I'm going to put him.

[Eric]

I want to stop this so bad right now. Please join a loop where he says, can you do an instant replay? Thank you. Okay, you're putting him at a tier. At a tier. Which one? No, that one. See, that one? I was doing it. But see, you didn't say that.

[Travis]

That's not true.

[Eric]

All right, at a tier. Wow.

[Travis]

Because this Stuff is really good. I just can't get on board for the no debt ever, no credit cards thing. I just, I just can't. I can't do it.

[Eric]

What about Ramit Sethi?

[Travis]

I like his stuff a lot, actually. Although, full disclosure, I have not read his book. I will teach you to be rich. So I can't give like a full, like, S tier endorsement of him. So I'll thr him. I'll throw him in A tier as well.

[Eric]

You're way too nice a person to do tears with because.

[Travis]

Well, let's keep going.

[Eric]

All right. Rachel Cruz.

[Travis]

All right, I'll just to play the game, I'll put her a B tier.

[Eric]

Why? Because she's a woman. Travis. I love all the Ramsey personalities. I'm going to put them all A tier. Rachel B. Well, Travis Chapel exposed.

[Travis]

Frankly, it's just because I have not seen a ton of her stuff. So I, I don't.

[Eric]

Sounds like your fault to me.

[Travis]

It sounds like she seems very much like George. I just, I, I like, I like George's personality. I like what he brings to the table. Like, he, he asserts a lot of comedy.

[Eric]

You don't vibe as much with Rachel.

[Travis]

Right, right. Wow.

[Eric]

Okay. Do you want me to just move them all to the A tier just to, like, help you out?

[Travis]

We'll see.

[Eric]

Graham. Stephan.

[Travis]

All right.

[Eric]

Your new friend.

[Travis]

I'll put him at S tier.

[Kim]

Really?

[Eric]

Why do you put him at S tier? Just because you know him?

[Travis]

No, because he has a great balance. So like, he started off in real estate and was a real estate agent and then bought a bunch of houses. But he also highly encourages most people to just put their money in the markets and, and set it and forget it type of a thing. So he has a really balanced approach, but he does it from somebody who has a perspective on both of those things. Whereas, like, if you have, if you have somebody who's made all of their money in real estate, they're going to be obviously extremely biased to tell everybody that real estate's the most awesome thing that you can do without giving sufficient evidence for the downside, which is that your lack of knowledge can make you lose a lot of money really quickly. So I would put him at S tier because of his balanced approach to finances and that he's not just somebody who specializes in this one thing. Because then there's also people who are like, never bought a piece of real estate. And then they talk shit about real estate. And I'm like, okay, well, you don't, you can't. You can't come in and, like, pretend like it's this bad thing. You just have to say, I don't know. Yeah, just be honest and say, I don't know. Because I've never invested in real estate. Don't just trash the whole idea of putting money in real estate. So I'd put him s tier.

[Eric]

All right. Rich dad, poor dad, Robert Kiyosaki.

[Travis]

I'm gonna go B tier on this one.

[Eric]

Really?

[Travis]

Here's the thing. It's.

[Eric]

I knew. Can I say this? I knew you were gonna do that.

[Travis]

Really?

[Eric]

I. Yep.

[Travis]

Wait, why?

[Eric]

I just knew. Cause I know you're gonna just. It's gonna be. Cause he's too extreme.

[Travis]

Yeah.

[Eric]

And that's why. Yeah. Anyone that's, like, super polarizing I know

[Travis]

is usually like, well, he's too, like, guru coded.

[Eric]

Yeah.

[Travis]

You know what I'm saying?

[Eric]

You know what the worst. You know why I stopp him?

[Travis]

Why?

[Eric]

Or not why I stopped liking him. But the big turnoff clip that I saw of him was he did a podcast and he was laughing about this time. He evicted a family on Christmas. And he's like, have you ever seen that? Wait, can I show you? It was one of those. I was like, oh, this is an evils landlord stereotype Christmas. Oh, yeah, there you go. This is so. This is like the stereotype of landlords that, like, all landlords are evil, which I don't believe all landlords are evil. But this clip is great evidence process.

[Kim]

Remember that guy, Kim? I still remember. He wasn't paying you rent. And I walked up to the place and Kim had to evict the guy. And I gave you so much credit because he was about, let's say, 35 years old, pretty muscular. And Kim's standing there and the sheriff serves the guy for the eviction. I tell you, you haven't invict evicted somebody. It's pretty interested. Interesting. So the guy is coming down the house, he's emptying the property, and he's giving us a stink eye. He goes like, it's Christmas time. I got two kids, you know, But I still didn't pay the rent. And so he's being evicted, and every time he moves his stuff onto the sidewalk, he gives us a stink high. And I felt for you, Kim. I mean, you know, Kim's is. She's not very muscular. She's very attractive, but not muscular. This guy's giving her this. But the thing. This was the funniest thing. It's worth the misery. So this guy's giving me A stink eye. It's Christmas time. I think he's got two daughters. He's dragging his Christmas tree out and all this stuff. And he comes up to me and he's still giving me the stink eye. And he says, you know, it's Christmas and Kim just holds a line and what am I going to do with my furniture? You know, it's all on the sidewalk out there. And this truck pulls up. They loaded his furniture onto their truck. They thought it was, they thought it was rubbish.

[Eric]

Kevin.

[Kim]

I sat there talking to him. I'm looking over his shoulder and these guys are, oh, it must be Christmas. And they're throwing all of his furniture and his Christmas tree on their truck. And I said, well, if you keep talking to me, pretty soon for anything to move.

[Travis]

Oof.

[Eric]

That's a crazy.

[Travis]

Not a good look.

[Eric]

That's a crazy clip.

[Travis]

PR team should have been on that one.

[Eric]

Yeah. So B tier, huh?

[Travis]

Yeah, maybe C tier after watching that. No, here's, here's my, here's my overall take on, on Robert Kiyosaki. And to be frank, I don't follow a lot of his stuff because of this, but if I were ranking Rich Dad, Poor dad as a financial book, I would put it higher on the list. But him as a person to continual, to continually follow. Now to this day, I think a lot of the stuff that he does now is. My personal opinion from an outsider's perspective with not a lot of context, is that he does stuff now more for cash grab stuff because his brand is so big, because of rich, he can't

[Eric]

afford to do it.

[Travis]

Well, it's, it's sort of that like he's leveraging that thing from decades ago to continually build into his fame, but doesn't have anything new. So the stuff that he does, I've just, I get sketchy vibes from some of the stuff that he does because I'm like, oh, well, clearly that person's paying you to endorse this sketchy financial product because they know that you have a, an audience, an audience of people who trust you for that. And I don't think that he's doing a great job of like managing that, that influence that he's gained from his book. But the book itself is absolutely worth a read. So I would put the book higher than I would put Robert Kiyosaki himself.

[Eric]

Grant Cardone. I know this is the one that's going to cause you inner turmoil.

[Travis]

Yeah. Because I've always liked all of my interactions with him. I like his team a lot. He does do a bunch of polarizing stuff online all the time that makes it sort of difficult to defend him in some cases. But also I know people personally who've put a good amount of money in a lot of his real estate funds. They've never had, they've never missed a paycheck. Even when they said we might miss paychecks like during COVID and stuff. They're like a lot of real estate funds. And syndicators stopped paying during that time because of the obvious constraints that was happening that were happening in that space. And people were just unsure what was going on. So they sent out communication to say that like they would be halting them, but they ended up not doing it. And they actually have returned greater returns than they originally estimated. And it's been like eight years. So if he's running a Ponzi, and it's a very, very sophisticated Ponzi.

[Eric]

Yeah.

[Travis]

And I don't see any evidence of that. Not to mention like somebody who has that much public attention. The FTC and SEC is all over somebody like that. Like, he is not operating in secret at all. And he's raised 4 billion plus dollars of, of like unaccredited investor capital for his thing. Like he is the, the ultimate target for some of these government agencies and still came out pretty clean. And the only, the only, like there was a defamation case that he ended up winning against the former CEO of T Mobile, I want to say, who had to literally issue a public apology saying that he was wrong about Grant and that Grant is a legitimate guy and he did that with a big public beef that ended up going in.

[Eric]

Richard Branson too.

[Travis]

Richard Branson too. I didn't see that one.

[Eric]

I think, let me just double check.

[Travis]

But, but that's my point is to say that like it. He seems like one of those, one of those sketchy Internet characters and frankly, like his products. Maybe you could make the argument for his investment. I don't. His investment stuff, I don't, I don't see much evidence for. But I would put him at, I would put him at C tier or B tier because of what we talked about earlier. Like he, he has a product that he's trying to sell and all of his content goes into selling that product. So him encouraging people to like cash out their 401k that's invested in the stock market to put all their money into cardone capital is a clear conflict. So like the advice should be. And, or like when he says like, oh, if you're not making you Know, if you're only making a half a million dollars a year, you're broke and you should be embarrassed of yourself and all this stuff like that. That type of stuff to me is not my cup of tea. It's not my, it's not my favorite thing. I, I'm a big advocate of self awareness and creating the life that you want. I do think that more people should be making more money, which obviously is the reason that we do this show. But him saying that is obviously like, he's in an. He's. He. And to be fair to him, in that clip, he's talking, he's speaking at a conference to a bunch of business owners.

[Eric]

Yeah.

[Travis]

So it's a bunch of people who are in his direct audience and then it's posted online to a bunch of people who are not in his audience because they know it's going to be extremely polarizing, get a ton of traffic. And then ultimately he does have products and services to sell to that audience to help them make more money. His marketing products and his sales products and his info products are all built to help him make more money. So it is in his direct benefit to convince this audience that 400k is nothing and that you should want more. And if you do want more, we have this product that will help you go get more. So just understand those things that it's not always like in your best interest. It's in their best interest, but it doesn't necessarily mean that their best interest and your best interest are not aligned, if that makes sense.

[Eric]

Yeah.

[Travis]

So I would just say, like, take some of that stuff with a grain of salt and don't look at anybody. You know, do not treat men like gods. Like, do not look at anybody as they're the ultimate source of truth, or you'll find yourself, I think, hurting.

[Eric]

Yeah. For that decision, it was not Richard Branson, it was John Legere.

[Travis]

Yeah. Yeah, you're right.

[Eric]

The T mobile.

[Travis]

Okay. Okay.

[Eric]

CEO.

[Travis]

Yeah. 66. But he had to put out a.

[Eric]

Like he put out an apology. Yeah.

[Travis]

Did it say, did it say the apology? What? Because that was like a big deal.

[Eric]

Typical loss.

[Travis]

Because I was genuinely curious about, like, what was going to come out of that. Because obviously, like, this isn't just a random person. This is the CEO of T Mobile, which is also a very materially successful person. Person who has his own attorneys and things like that. So I was like, oh, well, we'll see what comes of this. And then it ended up with John Legier giving this big public apology.

[Eric]

Yes. I'VE thought about the statements I made about Grant Cardone in June 2023 and on reflection I regret making them. I don't want to go to court and yeah, very much career. I apologize to Mr. Cardone, his wife Elena Cardone, both his children Sebridic oh bless you. That was in the statement. Serena Cardone and Scarlett Cardone, Mr. Cardone's fans and followers, partners, investors and any person who may have been influenced by my statements. I said those who elected to redistribute and use the comments I made about Mr. Cardone as clickbait or headlines to take those recordings down. Let's play it right now. Mr. Cardone's life story is admirable and I respect his hard work to provide services to his customers and opportunities to Main street investors. I look forward to watching Rand's continued progress in business and investing. Sincerely, John Legere. How about that?

[Travis]

Yes. I put him B or C. Just

[Eric]

because of John Legere.

[Travis]

No.

[Eric]

Oh, Cardone B or C. Yeah, let's. Wow. Well, I think then Robert Kiyosaki should be C and Grant should be B. If you're doing that, that's fair. Let's say it. Where do you want. Where do you want me to go?

[Travis]

Yeah, let's put Robert Kiyosaki C. We'll put Grant B.

[Eric]

Okay, we're getting this. Getting spicy. Caleb Hammer.

[Travis]

You know, for all the clips that I've consumed, I've never watched any of his long form stuff so I don't know exactly like even what his like financial advice typically is. It seems to me that he's closer to someone like a Graham Stephan. Although maybe without the real estate experience.

[Eric]

It's definitely a little more edgelord too, I would say.

[Travis]

Yeah.

[Eric]

Which is kind of my own.

[Travis]

Has the entertainment spin on it to again for views. So because of that I probably put him A tier.

[Kim]

Really?

[Eric]

I'd put him in a D tier.

[Travis]

Really?

[Eric]

Yeah. It's on site with Caleb Hammer.

[Travis]

Is that true?

[Eric]

Yeah.

[Travis]

I don't like him because he makes fun of people.

[Eric]

I did like him but he's. He's. He's. I feel like he's super misogynist. I don't know. Like I feel like a lot like his titles are crazy. It's like this dumb bitch whore just wasted money on. It's like what the hell? Why are you saying yeah and I don't like all the, the AR slurs and all that. What?

[Travis]

Let's put him B tier.

[Eric]

I love that. Clever.

[Travis]

Well, I forgot there's a couple There's a couple clips I saw recently that I was like, ooh, I agree. But also, does that need to be a tier?

[Eric]

A's a misogynist. B tier.

[Travis]

Yeah. Well, the thing is, I don't think that you have to be that. I mean, it's what gets views on social, and I think that he knows that.

[Eric]

God, I know what's wrong with social.

[Travis]

Yeah.

[Eric]

All right. What about Vivian?

[Travis]

But also, I'd love to have Caleb on the show, so.

[Kim]

Sure.

[Travis]

Yeah.

[Eric]

Vivian 2. Forget I said that. Caleb, if you come on the show. Just kidding.

[Travis]

This is. This is difficult because I have. She. She sort of falls under the same category as Caleb is. Like, I've seen a lot of her stuff, but I have not seen enough to know, like, what her. Like, I have not read her book. This is like your rich bff, right?

[Eric]

Yeah.

[Travis]

So I. My gut tells me that she's probably like a B tier. Be like anybody that's giving personal finance advice. It's like this. Like, she would be similar to Ramit for me. But also. But also the reason that, again, the reason why I like Graham at the S tier is that he did a bunch in real estate as well and.

[Eric]

And other things he's just done. He's tested a ton of different vehicles.

[Travis]

Right. So yeah, let's put her. Let's put her a B tier because. But that's not. That's not to say she doesn't deserve to be A tier. It's just that I have not consumed enough of her content to know whether she should be in the A tier or the B tier.

[Eric]

Cody Sanchez.

[Travis]

I'd put her probably B tier as well.

[Eric]

You're such a middle of the road fella. Look at this.

[Travis]

Because maybe C tier only because the financial advice that she gives is not actually financial. It's not personal finance advice. It's entrepreneurship advice, which only goes to 5% of the population. And I think similar to Cardone, that she. That she does not accurately represent the downside of the thing that she encourages people to do. Like, for a lot of people buying a business, though, it seems to be less of a risk. Could potentially actually be more of a risk because they've never ran a business. It's like she has an MBA and worked on Wall street for several years and has a deep understanding of finances and knows how to examine a P and L and see if the business is in a healthy situation or what the pot. Potential holes in the business are that she could fill after she takes it over to turn it around. And make it more successful. So it just requires a lot more skill, expertise, knowledge about operating a business than I think her, the majority of her content implies. So I would just say, like, be careful like that, that's one of those things where it's like you could get in over your head very quickly by going and securing some sort of a loan or even an owner financing deal and getting into a. Like, it's an irreversible decision. Yeah, you know, you have to be careful with, with your reversible decisions where it's like, you acquire this business, it's yours. So you get in and you're day 42 into the business and you start seeing a bunch of stuff that you didn't uncover in due diligence because you didn't know how to do it, you know, and now it's yours. So like, you have to deal with those problems now regardless. Like you have a half a million dollar SBA loan or, you know what I mean? Like, it's now your responsibility and it is, that is irreversible. So, yeah, I would just say, like, be careful. And then she obviously has products and services to help people buy businesses. So there's a clear financial benefit when her advice is taken. Not to say that the advice is bad advice or that it's not, not good. Because I like a lot of her stuff and I've subscribed to her newsletter for a long time and I think it's really great. And I think she's brilliant at operating businesses and acquiring businesses and knows what to look for. She's really, really good at what she does. So that's not to say that you shouldn't follow her. It's just to say that, like, if you are the average person, it's probably not the best thing to follow.

[Eric]

I gotta end with a grand poobah of finance advice. Certainly the most famous, I would say Dave Ramsey. Where do you put him?

[Travis]

He's a tier.

[Eric]

I thought you were. You tricked me. I thought you were gonna say S tier really, just for the scale of how big and consistent it is.

[Travis]

Yeah, and I agree with all of that. I just, again, I cannot get on board for the no credit cards thing. And my gut at this point is that the only reason that he doesn't have them is because of his brand. Like, he knows if you are financially disciplined and you have a credit card, that decision's not going to ruin you. Like him getting credit cards or leveraging debt at this point in his career, he knows how to do it. He knows how to play that game. He just does not ever do it because it would go against all of the things that he preaches, the millions of people that listen to him. So fantastic. Phenomenal guy. Built an amazing business. Have nothing but respect for him and everything they built at Ramsey. But yeah, I, I just, I can't get on board for like, never ever use debt. Never ever have a credit card. Don't worry about your credit score. I just don't. I, I don't find that to be super valuable for every single person on the planet there. Like, I, I look at Dave as like the, the gateway, the gateway drug for financial advice. It's like you got to get started somewhere. And if you're in a terrible financial sit. Dave's help to get you out of that terrible financial situation and you might need, you know, to learn how to budget for the first time or to learn how to, to, to. To put your money in safe investments and things like that. And, and he doesn't have any financial investment products that are designed to get you to subscribe to this thing. And, and he does a great job at parsing through all of the other bullshit like the, you know, life insurance policies that people use and, and things like that. He just cuts through a lot of that. So he's absolutely towards the top of the list. I just, I cannot get on board for like, never ever have a credit card. Don't worry about your credit score. Have a zero credit score. Don't even worry. Like, I just, I can't get on board for it. So I put him at eight tier.

[Eric]

All right, well, if you're listening, Graham Stephan is the clear winner.

[Travis]

I think so.

[Eric]

He's s tier.

[Travis]

That feel, that feels correct to me. I'm looking at the list now. It feels, it feels correct.

[Eric]

Anything you want to change?

[Travis]

No, no. The only thing I would say is like, I feel, I feel a little bit bad about like, Ramit and Vivian and Rachel because I have not consumed enough volume of their content to accurately represent where they maybe should be in this list. So that would be my only caveat. But in terms of the people that I know, I think that that's. I think that's a strong list.

[Eric]

I, I forgot there's one more person I need to put. Go ahead and just do some filler here.

[Travis]

Don't do this.

[Eric]

I gotta put one more person on the table. Don't do it real quick.

[Travis]

I really don't want you to do this.

[Eric]

I do want to do it real quick. I'm just going to do it real quick. So you just go ahead and chit chat for a minute. I'm going to get this.

[Travis]

Yeah, but ultimately I think.

[Eric]

There we go.

[Travis]

I think Graham stuff is just non biased. He doesn't have. There's no financial upside for you taking his advice or not taking his advice. He's tested and tried a bunch of different things. He's owned a lot of real estate, he's bought a bunch of stocks. He's. He's just tested and tried so many things. And I. And now, honestly, having met him, it adds to it because I genuinely just think that he's a good dude and he's doing it for the right reasons.

[Eric]

I forgot to add this one to the list beforehand. As seen in Louis Theroux, the Manosphere HS Tikitaki is a financial advisor. Where would you put him?

[Travis]

He actually looks great right there at the bottom. Under D tier.

[Eric]

Under D. Like if there's an F tier.

[Travis]

If there's an F tier that exists,

[Eric]

you don't want to. He's not S for Sigma Male or A for Alpha Mal.

[Travis]

He doesn't even. He shouldn't even be.

[Eric]

Can't even move him. He got stuck. He's stuck in S. I can't even move him out. Well, all right, well, you heard it here first. Travis highly recommends the financial services. Oh, God, is he still in jail? Actually, I don't know. Jail. Let's see.

[Travis]

Yeah, if there's an F tier, you put him there. Yeah, he's put him under D. Where you had him first is actually perfect.

[Eric]

Just not on the list.

[Travis]

Exactly. Gone completely from the world.

[Eric]

All right, well, thanks. Thanks for doing that. We should do more of these.

[Travis]

Yeah, that was solid. That was solid. Anyway, if you're tuning in, go check out some of these people's content and highly recommend Graham stuff. Just look for people who again, it. Just because somebody is gaining something financially from their advice does not mean that their advice is incorrect. It does mean that you should interrogate the advice a little bit more and ask a couple more questions. So that's why I like following people who don't have. Have that to a certain degree because it just makes me feel better about the advice that they're giving, that it's truly objective and that there's not some sort of a reason that they're giving it. So anyway, as always with financial advice, just be careful who you're listening to because a lot of people have been burned in this space. That's it for this episode of the show. Thanks for tuning in. Remember, money only solves your money problems. But it's easier to solve the rest of your problems. You got money in the bank, so let's start there. Here on the Travis Makes Money podcast. Catch you next time. Peace.