007 | From Accountant to Full-Time Entrepreneur | PT Money

PT Money is the founder of FinCon and a personal finance blogger at PTMoney.com. In today’s episode, I get a chance to interview him LIVE at FinCon to share his financial journey.
Episode Summary

* Around age 24, PT realized that he was “not moving forward financially”. He describes how he “had debt” and “wasn’t saving at all”.
* After discovering Dave Ramsey, PT used the debt snowball approach to pay down his loans.
* Diving deeper into the rabbit hole, PT started reading personal finance websites and learning that he should max out his 401K, IRA, and HSA accounts.
* PT’s savvy investing was mainly driven by his “anti-government, anti-establishment” mindset and the notion of “reducing taxes as much as possible”.
* In order to further advance his financial position, PT started to automate his contributions and invest in a taxable account (after maxing out his pre-tax accounts).
* Around this same time, PT started his blog PT Money in order to document his financial journey.
* He soon discovered that this “hobby” could earn him some real money. He went from earning his mortgage payment, to 1/3 of his W2 income, to ½ of his W2 income before quitting his day job in 2010.
* Running PTMoney.com soon became his day job, so naturally, he needed a new side hustle!
* In 2011, FinCon was born! PT was not satisfied with the other personal finance conferences he attended, so he decided to start his own.
* He created a map outlining the location of all of his personal finance blogger friends. After careful deliberation, he decided that Chicago was the best location to host his first event.
* In order to make the event successful, PT diligently studied other conferences and leaned on his network for their expertise. He says “I tend to lean on people I trust”.
* The first FinCon had nearly 250 attendees (compared to the 30 expected from PT).
* At this LIVE FinCon 2018 interview, there were OVER 2,000 people at the event!

Key Takeaways

* Just get started! – PT says that he had no idea what he was doing when he first launched his blog in 2007. He just “leaned into the passion and put down the distractions”. Fortunately, he quickly realized that this hobby of his could bring in some real money. His advice to aspiring entrepreneurs is “don’t feel like you need to jump into it… don’t be afraid to do it on the side”. It took PT three years after starting his blog to quit his day job, you don’t have to take a crazy entrepreneurial leap if you don’t want to.

 

* Leverage Your Network – Having a strong network is so powerful for an entrepreneur. PT leaned on the expertise of his friends and colleagues to make FinCon successful. His first three employees were all friends from college! He warns “don’t feel like whatever you've created needs to be solely under your control or in your name.” Open-source entrepreneurship allows you to play to your strengths and to let others complement your weaknesses. Don’t be afraid to leverage your network!

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Links from the Episode
PT Money | Twitter