Martinis and Your Money Podcast
This podcast presents various topics around money and careers in a fun and lighthearted setting. The host, Shannon McLay, is a successful entrepreneur, author, and personal finance expert with a passion for helping people get and stay financially fit. In each episode, Shannon will share a martini (or something similar) with friends and experts while discussing money and career topics.
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Personal Relationships
10/04/2024
Personal Relationships
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Side Hustles and Entrepreneurship with The Happy Hour Crew
09/27/2024
Side Hustles and Entrepreneurship with The Happy Hour Crew
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From Side to Full Hustle with Cadence Dubus
09/20/2024
From Side to Full Hustle with Cadence Dubus
We are officially in the second to last month of the podcast. So, I decided my final topic would be around side hustling and entrepreneurship, which, you can imagine, are subjects near and dear to my heart. The Financial Gym has taken me on an 11-year entrepreneurial journey, and it would have started as a side hustle if I was allowed to coach people on the side from my day job as a financial advisor. In August of 2013, I made the wild decision to jump full force into an entrepreneurial journey without testing it via a side hustle. While I’m thankful for the journey, I would advise everyone else to start with the side hustle before it becomes the full hustle. So this month I’m going to share with you stories from side hustle through full entrepreneurship and everywhere in between. Joining me today is Cadence Dubus, who combined her love of dancing and her need to make money into a career in fitness that started from instructor to multi-gym owner to virtual business owner. Like me, Cadence didn’t set out to become an entrepreneur, but she’s become an amazing one in her own right. I am inspired by Cadence’s strength and tenacity, and I hope you are too. For more information, visit the show notes:
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Accidental Side Hustling with Amanda
09/13/2024
Accidental Side Hustling with Amanda
We are officially in the second to last month of the podcast and it’s my final month of guest interviews. So, I decided my final topic guest interviews would be around side hustling and entrepreneurship, which you can imagine are subjects near and dear to my heart. The Financial Gym has taken me on an 11-year entrepreneurial journey, and it would have started as a side hustle if I was allowed to coach people on the side from my day job as a financial advisor. In August of 2013, I made the wild decision jump full force into an entrepreneurial journey without testing it via side hustle, and while I’m thankful for the journey, I would advise everyone else to start with the side hustle before it becomes the full hustle. So this month I’m going to share with you stories from side hustle through full entrepreneurship and everywhere in between. Joining me today is long time podcast listener and long time Financial Gym client, Amanda, who has recently launched an HR-based side hustle called Now What HR. She joins me to share her journey to side hustling and why she decided to start one now, especially when it was never a destination on her financial roadmap. And now here’s Amanda. For more information, visit the show notes:
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Side Hustles with with Gala Aranaga
09/06/2024
Side Hustles with with Gala Aranaga
We are officially in the second to last month of the podcast and it’s actually my final month of guest interviews. So I decided my final topic guest interviews would be around side hustling and entrepreneurship, which you can imagine are subjects near and dear to my heart. The Financial Gym has taken me on an 11-year entrepreneurial journey and it would have started as a side hustle if I was allowed to coach people on the side from my day job as a financial advisor. In August of 2013, I made the wild decision jump full force into an entrepreneurial journey without testing it via side hustle, and while I’m thankful for the journey, I would advise everyone else to start with the side hustle before it becomes the full hustle. So this month I’m going to share with you stories from side hustle through full entrepreneurship and everywhere in between. Joining me today is Gala Aranaga, a lifelong creative who allowed her creative energy to lead her to various side hustles from composing music to buying a theater. Gala joins me today to talk about her journey, about why the word hustle gets a bad rap and why you should never be afraid to try anything once. For more information, visit the show notes:
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August Recap with the Happy Hour Crew
08/30/2024
August Recap with the Happy Hour Crew
Today is the last Friday of the month, and my regular listeners know that on the last Friday of the month, I host the happy hour on the podcast, where I gather great friends with me to drink cheap drinks and talk about money topics. This month, I’ve talked about a number of topics with my Financial Gym teammates, and we’re talking about them during happy hour. You’ll hear our thoughts on buying vs. renting, the financial challenges we’ve had as pet owners, and our biggest learning lessons from investing our own money. As usual, this is a great conversation and there will only be two more Happy Hours after this one. For more information, visit the show notes:
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Investing Mistakes with Kadri and Joy
08/23/2024
Investing Mistakes with Kadri and Joy
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Planning for Pets with Sara Belhouari
08/16/2024
Planning for Pets with Sara Belhouari
This month I’ve got a mixed bag of topics to talk to you about and I’m tagging in my amazing training team at Financial Gym to help me Gymsplain some of these topics and also give perspective on what they see on a daily basis from clients. I just discussed home buying decisions and when to buy or rent and then next logical financial topic to me was thinking about who or what would you have in your home and that’s pets. I have said this many times throughout the years but at Financial Gym, we have more clients who have goals of having fur babies rather than human babies and the large majority of our clients are already fur parents and from a trainer perspective, we see the financial challenges being a fur parent presents. Joining me today is Sara Belhouari, Financial Gym trainer and also fur parent to discuss how she helps her client’s budget for and plan for their fur babies but also the challenges she has had in her journey. And now here’s Sara. For more information, visit the show notes at
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Should I Work With a Mortgage Broker?
08/09/2024
Should I Work With a Mortgage Broker?
This month, I've got a mixed bag of topics, and I'm tagging in my amazing training team at Financial Gym to help me Gymsplain some of them and also give perspective on what they see on a daily basis from clients. In these first two episodes of this month, I'm talking about home ownership. I always say that it's expensive to get into a home, and it's expensive to get out of a home. Given how expensive it is these days, it's a decision not to be taken lightly, and honestly, it's a decision that is becoming less and less important for many of the clients we see. Joining me today is Financial Gym Trainer Jill Wagner, who is also a licensed real estate agent and mortgage broker, to talk about what mortgage brokers do, why and when you would want to utilize a mortgage broker, and common mistakes and misconceptions when people are buying homes, especially first time home buyers. For more information, visit the show notes:
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Owning vs. Renting with Financial Trainer Sam Cash
08/02/2024
Owning vs. Renting with Financial Trainer Sam Cash
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Clear Intentions and Goals with The Happy Hour Crew
07/26/2024
Clear Intentions and Goals with The Happy Hour Crew
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Manifesting Your Biggest Dreams with Malyia
07/19/2024
Manifesting Your Biggest Dreams with Malyia
Hello Martinis and Your Money Listeners! We’ve got four months to go until the end of this podcast and I couldn’t be more excited about all of the new episodes coming your way. It’s July and because of the July Fourth holiday I always think about Financial Independence this month. For the past 15 years of my life, I have coached dozens of individuals to and through Financial Independence and the biggest factor I see between people who are close to achieving it or have already achieved it is a belief or manifestation in something big. And when I say something big, I want to clarify that “big” is a relative term and it’s different for every single one of my clients, but if you are someone living in a scarcity mindset, you will have a difficult time getting to FI and you may be your biggest roadblock to getting there. This month, I am going to share with you three people’s stories that will blow your minds. All of them started probably similar to wherever you are now and within 5-10 years they have achieved some massive goals and yes you heard me right 5-10 years. FI is not a goal to be achieved overnight, but it’s a goal that with enough mindset and manifestation can be accomplished sooner than later. Doesn’t it make sense to work really hard for 5-10 years to have the next 20+ of freedom for yourself? I think so. Joining me today is Malyia McNaughton founder of Made by Malyia. Malyia has been on the show twice before, so if you want more of her backstory, I recommend you listen to those previous episodes, but spoiler alert she has built a successful jewelry brand with no real experience and bootstrapped much of her journey. I have been a fan of Malyia’s since I saw her progression hoops on display in Financial Gym’s headquarters almost 5 years ago now. Malyia joins me to share her story of not only survival but how she’s thriving despite all of the naysayers and challenges that have come her way. For more information, visit the show notes:
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The Journey to Financial Independence with Sam Mellone
07/12/2024
The Journey to Financial Independence with Sam Mellone
It’s July, and because of the July Fourth holiday, I always think about Financial Independence. For the past 15 years of my life, I have coached dozens of individuals to and through Financial Independence, and the biggest factor I see between people who are close to achieving it or have already achieved it is a belief or manifestation in something big. When I say something big, I want to clarify that “big” is a relative term. It’s different for every single one of my clients, but if you are someone living in a scarcity mindset, you will have a difficult time getting to FI, and you may be your biggest roadblock to getting there. This month, I am going to share three people’s stories with you that will blow your minds. All of them started probably similar to wherever you are now, and within 5-10 years, they have achieved some massive goals, and yes, you heard me right, 5-10 years. FI is not a goal to be achieved overnight, but it’s a goal that, with enough mindset and manifestation, can be accomplished sooner than later. Doesn’t it make sense to work really hard for 5-10 years to have the next 20+ of freedom for yourself? I think so. Joining me today is long-time Financial Gym client Sam Mellone, founder of CoCo Marketing. Sam joins me to discuss her journey from making less than $40,000 a year to the 6-figure business she has built in less than 5 years. For more information, visit the show notes:
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Manifesting and Financial Abundance with Anne Mahlum
07/05/2024
Manifesting and Financial Abundance with Anne Mahlum
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Insurance and Risk Management with The Happy Hour Crew
06/28/2024
Insurance and Risk Management with The Happy Hour Crew
Today is the last Friday of the month, and my regular listeners know that on the last Friday of the month, I host the happy hour on the podcast, where I gather great friends with me to drink cheap drinks and talk about money topics. This month, I've focused on risk management, which means thinking about financial products like insurance or trust and estate management. These are pretty much the subjects of financial planning that no one likes to talk about because they involve planning for potentially bad things happening. After fifteen years of financial planning, the one lesson I have learned is that bad things happen all the time (typically when we're not expecting them), and the best way to weather the storm, so to speak, is planning in advance for it. My friends joined me to talk about how planning for the worst not only helped them financially but also helped them feel confident and secure during those tough times. For more information, visit the show notes:
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Estate Planning with Lillie N. Nkenchor (REPLAY)
06/21/2024
Estate Planning with Lillie N. Nkenchor (REPLAY)
This month I’m talking about Risk Management on the podcast, also known as the area of financial planning that no one wants to talk about and today’s subject is certainly the subject I find clients the least interested in and that is Trust and Estate Planning or planning for a death. Planning for death is certainly not something any of us would get excited about but as a financial planner for almost 15 years, I can tell you that I’ve seen clients experience it and I’ve seen clients suffer from not being prepared for it. There is nothing worse than losing a loved one, but the only thing I can imagine worse than that is also not having a plan for when they pass, it creates a tremendous amount of stress and burden on those they’ve left behind. Today’s episode is unfortunately going to have to be a replayed episode but the content is still what I would recommend. Full disclosure, I was hoping to get Lillie back on to record another episode but she just had her first baby and having been in her seat 18 years ago as the working mom of a newborn baby, I know that the last thing she has time for is a podcast recording with me, but I want to continue to shine a light on the work Lillie does and has done and hopefully you’ll want to work with her and her team so she can start saving for her child’s college savings. Anyway, joining me for this replayed episode is Lillie Nkenchor, President of Lillie Nkenchor PC and she discusses why she became a trust and estate attorney and why you don’t have to be wealthy to think about trust and estate planning. For more information, visit the show notes:
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Chatting with Kara from the Frugal Feminista
06/14/2024
Chatting with Kara from the Frugal Feminista
This month's topic is Risk Management. Risk management is an area of financial planning that no one wants to talk about or think about, but it's a necessary component. If you're not prepared for what could be the worst-case scenario, then you'll not only experience a personal shock like an accident or death, but you'll also experience a series of unfortunate financial surprises. You may be surprised about today's guest as the show doesn't align with typical risk management subjects like insurance. I'm talking about having a healthy relationship with money with Kara Stevens, founder of Frugal Feminista. Kara joins me to talk about her book, "Heal Your Relationship with Money," her personal journey, and all of the financial benefits she has received from developing a better relationship with money. As much as any financial product can impact your finances, I think nothing can impact it more than your mindset. I highly encourage you to invest time in this episode and book if you don't have a healthy relationship with money. For more information, visit the show notes:
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Disability Insurance with Kelly McConnell
06/07/2024
Disability Insurance with Kelly McConnell
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Traveling with The Happy Hour Crew
05/31/2024
Traveling with The Happy Hour Crew
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Banking On Change with James Robert
05/24/2024
Banking On Change with James Robert
This final season of my show is going so fast, and I only have a little over five months left to share with you the remaining topics and guests before we say our final goodbye in October. You know that I have had a theme for months, but every now and then, I take a break from the theme to bring a voice or concept to you that I think is thought-provoking or important. Joining me today is James Robert Lay, founder of the Digital Growth Institute and author of the book Banking on Change. I have had multiple conversations with James Robert over the past few years and think he has a truly brilliant view of where financial institutions need to go and how many of us, as leaders and teammates, should be viewing change and how that impacts the future of our companies. This episode is a conversation I don't think you should miss, no matter what industry you work in. For more information, visit the show notes at
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Living As Digital Nomads with Chelsea & Todd
05/17/2024
Living As Digital Nomads with Chelsea & Todd
This final season of my show is going so fast and I only have a little over five months left to share with you the remaining topics and guests before we say our final goodbye in October. I have a number of shows this month focused on travel in anticipation for summer. I’ve been a financial planner now for over 14 years and in all those years I think every single one of my clients was always planning for some trip during the summer months and this summer is no different. Whether the trips are for weddings, family reunions, kids’ baseball games, concert events or just because, travel is something we are always planning with our clients. Joining me today are my longtime clients Todd and Chelsea. They’ve been on the show before and they join me this month to talk about how travel literally changed not only how they view life but how they now live their lives as digital nomads, and soon Baby Parker will be joining her parents for the digital nomadic lifestyle. I am always so inspired by Todd and Chelsea’s adventurous spirits and I hope you are too. For more information, visit the show notes at .
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Retire Often with Jillian
05/10/2024
Retire Often with Jillian
This final season of my show is going fast and I only have six full months left to share with you the final topics and guests before we say our final goodbye. I initially intended May to be focused on travel in anticipation for summer. I have been a financial planner now for over 14 years and in all of those years, I think every single one of my clients was always planning for some trip during the summer months and this summer is no different. Whether the trips are for weddings, family reunions, kid’s baseball games, concert events or just because, travel is always something we’re planning with our clients. Joining me today is Jillian Johnsrud, Progress Coach and founder of the site Retire Often. Full disclosure, we were going to talk about travel more but you’ll see that our conversation took a turn into a subject matter that I think is travel-adjacent and that’s mini-retirements and sabbaticals. I think this is actually the perfect kickoff episode to the month as nothing else could get you motivated to book travel than knowing you don’t have to work for the next month. Curious about why you should plan your mini-retirement, stay tuned. For more information, visit the shownotes:
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Credit Card Travel Hacking with Austin Riffe (Replay)
05/03/2024
Credit Card Travel Hacking with Austin Riffe (Replay)
This final season of my show is going fast and I only have six full months left to share with you the final topics and guests before we say our final goodbye and I have devoted the month of May to discussing travel and all things travel adjacent. I have been a financial planner now for over 14 years and in all of those years, I think every single one of my clients was always planning for some trip during the summer months and this summer is no different. Whether the trips are for weddings, family reunions, kid’s baseball games, concert events or just because, travel is always something we’re planning with our clients. Today’s episode is my first and hopefully last replay for this final season. Due to scheduling challenges and the death of a close friend of mine, Austin and I were not able to get together to record a new episode; however, most of what we shared in this episode is still true and Austin is still continuing to work with and support people looking to travel with rewards points. I just finished working with Vinnie on booking our travel to Ireland in June to celebrate Will’s high school graduation and every time we went to use our points, I kept thinking “I should have turned this over to Austin to begin with.” Earning travel rewards is key, but more so than earning them is also spending them the best way and that’s where resources like Austin can really help you get the most bang for your travel rewards points. For more information, visit the show notes:
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Frugality & Budgeting with The Happy Hour Crew
04/26/2024
Frugality & Budgeting with The Happy Hour Crew
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Talking with Mom, the Birthday Episode
04/19/2024
Talking with Mom, the Birthday Episode
If you're listening to this episode on the day it debuted, you're officially listening on my birthday, April 19th. For my final season of the show, I thought I would bring on the woman who was there from the beginning. Not only the woman who gave me life but also my hero, my mother, Jamie. She joins me to share family stories, especially how my grandparents built a church in Queens, NY, and relive some funny stories of my youth and what I was like growing up (spoiler alert, I've always been a type A overachiever). I hope you enjoy hearing more about the woman who raised me and the family that inspired my journey. For more information, visit the show notes:
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Catching up with Liz Frugalwoods
04/12/2024
Catching up with Liz Frugalwoods
We are now in April, and I only have seven more months left of new episodes for Martinis and Your Money. As sad as I am to say goodbye to this podcast, I'm equally excited about the final season of episodes I'm delivering to you every Friday. Each month of this final year is broken down by subjects that are important for anyone's financial health journey, and I'm bringing to you the best guests around each of these subject matters but also sharing with you the best tips and practices I've learned in the last 15+ years. April is a short month as far as Fridays are concerned, and it's also my birthday month, so I decided to talk about a subject that I personally used to hate but now I love, and that's budgeting and frugality. Joining me today is who I consider to be my OG Queen of Frugality, and that is long-time Martinis and Your Money friend, guest, and Happy Hour Co-Host, Liz Thames, aka Mrs. Frugalwoods. Liz joins me today to talk about why we both love the frugal approach and the crazy expensive purchase she recently made, and she shares her best tips and suggestions for someone new to a frugal journey. For more information, visit the show notes:
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Why Budgeting is a Dirty Word with Kim
04/05/2024
Why Budgeting is a Dirty Word with Kim
I only have seven more months left of new episodes for Martinis and Your Money. As sad as I am to say goodbye to this podcast, I’m equally excited about the final season of episodes I’m delivering to you every Friday. Each month of this finally year is broken down by subjects that are important for anyone’s financial health journey and I’m bringing to you the best guests around these subject matters but also sharing with you the best tips and practices I’ve learned around these areas in the last 15+ years. April is a short month as far as Fridays are concerned and it’s also my birthday month so I decided to talk about a subject that I personally used to hate but now I love and that’s budgeting. Joining me today is Kim Bigby, a financial trainer at Financial Gym and longtime budget lover. Kim joins me today to share her thoughts on budgeting and we both share best practices on finding budgets for clients and our secret for success here at Financial Gym. For more information, visit the show notes:
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Relationships & Money with the Happy Hour Crew
03/29/2024
Relationships & Money with the Happy Hour Crew
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Starting a Business with Your Romantic Partner with The Debt Free Guys
03/22/2024
Starting a Business with Your Romantic Partner with The Debt Free Guys
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Financial Honesty and Transparency with Dolores
03/15/2024
Financial Honesty and Transparency with Dolores
2024 will be a big year for me personally and professionally, but unfortunately, it means the end of new content for Martinis and Your Money in October. My plan for this final season is to highlight a new financial topic each month. This month, I'm talking about relationships and money. It's estimated that money problems lead to 20-40% of divorces and from my seat as a financial planner for over the last 12 years, I can tell you that those numbers are accurate. This month, we're going to talk about the pitfalls money can have on relationships and the solutions to building a financially healthy and safe foundation for two people to navigate. Last week, I spoke with Tracy Coenen about financial infidelity, and this week, I'm talking to podcast listener and Financial Gym client Dolores about her personal experience with financial infidelity. Dolores joins me to share how she hid tens of thousands of dollars of debt from her partner and why their relationship is stronger than ever despite the infidelity. For more information, visit the show notes:
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