On this episode of the Get Ready Before Life Happens Podcast, I spoke with Brandon Lovingier, Founder of Military Money, about the tactics financial predators use and how military members (and all of us) can stay one step ahead.

 

Key Takeaways:

 

🔹Start with your goals, then decide if a product helps you get there.

🔹 Ask questions, until you understand what you’re investing in or purchasing

🔹 Understand your benefits. For example, you don’t need to pay anyone to “unlock” your VA benefits.

🔹 Slow down, time pressure lends to suboptimal decision making

🔹 Understand how someone gets paid and their underlying incentives.

🔹 How military members (and all of us) guard against financial predators.

🔹 Be wary of pitches that lean on military status or shared connections.

🔹 Learn how a Military Qualified Financial Planner can help protect you.

 

 🎥 Watch this episode below: 

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🎧 Listen to the podcast below or on your favorite podcast app.

 

 

 

 

Connect with Brandon Lovingier: 

 

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brandonlovingier/
• YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@enlistedmoney
• Website: https://enlistedmoney.com/
• Instagram- https://www.instagram.com/enlistedmoneyguy
• Facebook- https://www.facebook.com/enlistedmoneyguy/

 

Resources mentioned: 

 

• Consumer Financial Protection Bureau: https://www.consumerfinance.gov/complaint/
• Military Qualified Financial Planner designation: https://mqfp.org

 

Bio:

 

Brandon Lovingier, ChFC®, AFC®, MQFP®, wasn’t born into money. He joined the Army right out of high school and has served for over 20 years on active duty – including deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan. When he was younger, he wasted money on trucks, beer, cigarettes, energy drinks, and everything in between. At one point, he and his wife had to put rent on a credit card just to get by.

 

Fast forward, they’re debt-free and building wealth. He established his blog, Enlisted Money, to help enlisted service members avoid the same mistakes he made. He earned his Chartered Financial Consultant – ChFC® designation in 2022 and is one of the first Military Qualified Financial Planner – MQFP® designation holders. He was awarded The American College of Financial Services NextGen Financial Professional Award for 2024. He’s been a speaker at MilMoneyCon and loves mentoring other service members on their own financial freedom journey.

 

👉 Start Your Financial Readiness Plan: A free, practical plan that helps you create your in-case-of-emergency Financial First Aid Kit, organize what matters, and prepare before life happens. Start Your Free Financial Readiness Plan  https://www.tonysteuer.com

 

👉 Support the Mission: Become a Get Ready Insider and receive access to the Get Ready Library while helping support my mission to help people prepare before life happens. Become a Get Ready Insider  https://www.tonysteuer.com/get-ready-insider

Episode Transcript

This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.

Tony: Welcome to Get Ready: Before Life Happens, helping people navigate life’s what-ifs.

Today, I’m joined by Brandon Lovinger, and we’ll be talking about how military members, and really all of us, can stay sharp to spot and stop financial predators.

Brandon, welcome. Great to have you here today.

Brandon: Thanks for having me, Tony. I’m glad to be here.

Tony: I’m excited.

Tell us a little bit about your origin story. How did you get from being a military member to becoming so focused on financial predators and financial education?

Brandon: Long story short, I joined the Army right out of high school.

I came from humble means.

We weren’t poor by any means, but bread and gravy was definitely a whole meal at our house.

I wasn’t really aware of how financial institutions worked or how money worked.

So I immediately started digging myself a hole of debt.

I had a steady paycheck, and everybody wanted to loan me money.

So why not?

Fast forward to me sitting in a cold, stinky tent in Afghanistan looking through bank statements.

I realized, “This isn’t going to work. This isn’t sustainable. I’m spending a ton of money on financing and debt, and there has to be something better.”

That was really the beginning of me learning about money.

Eventually, my wife and I became debt-free.

Then I started helping my soldiers.

That led to me getting even more interested in financial planning.

I went through the CFP education program, earned my ChFC designation, AFC designation, MQFP, and I’m still going.

This is just what I do now.

I like helping other people with money so they don’t have to struggle the way I did, because so much of that struggle is unnecessary.

Tony: When you talk about debt, I fell into the same trap in college.

“Hey, free credit cards. This is great.”

Then the other side hits you.

I would call that a money trap.

Maybe predatory is the right word for some of the ways these products are marketed.

What do you think?

Brandon: There’s a lot to be said about the naivety of young people in general.

But these companies also know what they’re doing.

They know that young people at 18 or 19 generally aren’t thinking everything through or thinking very far into the future.

One of the key things about debt is that you’re taking your future-earned dollars and pulling them into the present.

Future you is probably going to be upset with younger you.

That isn’t unique to me.

It can definitely be misleading when somebody says, “You can just make this low monthly payment,” while masking or disguising what the real total cost is.

Tony: That’s a really good way of putting it.

When I got into debt, that was exactly it.

It was the low monthly payment.

If I had only made the minimum payment, I’d probably still be paying the debt forever.

That really is a trap.

Brandon: Yes.

And even when the full cost is disclosed, it may be glazed over or hidden somewhere.

I remember I had a soldier who got married and immediately went to a rent-to-own place.

He said, “I need furniture for my house. I have to support my family.”

He got everything in his house through that store.

I knew enough at that point to realize this probably wasn’t going to work out well.

I grabbed his statements and showed him.

“It says right here that if you make this payment, this isn’t going to be a $1,500 couch anymore. It could become a $4,500 couch.”

He kind of explained it away because it’s embarrassing to realize what you’ve gotten yourself into.

But I could look at his monthly statement and know what he was earning.

It was clear that this wasn’t going to work long-term.

Tony: Just real quickly, can you explain what rent-to-own means for people watching and listening who aren’t familiar with it?

Brandon: A rent-to-own business is somewhere you essentially rent an item, but if you continue making payments long enough, eventually you own it.

There can be a lot of terms and conditions in those contracts.

There may be deductions for use, damage, or other things.

For the most part, you’re effectively financing the item through the company.

The costs can be very high.

I couldn’t speak intelligently about current rates, but historically I’ve seen examples where the effective costs were extremely high.

Tony: That’s incredible.

I think one of the things I’m trying to help people with is understanding that there are so many different forms of debt and financing.

It can be dizzying.

If you don’t know the right questions to ask, you don’t even know where to begin.

Do you find that’s especially important with service members because they tend to be younger?

Brandon: Yes.

The majority of people joining the military are somewhere in that 18-to-24 age range.

And from my experience as a recruiter, many people who enlisted weren’t necessarily coming from a place of financial abundance.

That doesn’t mean everybody was poor.

People join from all different demographics and economic backgrounds.

But many of the people I recruited were lower-income, weren’t college-bound, or didn’t have money to pay for college.

Tony: I think that’s important for people to recognize.

And thank you for your service, of course.

One thing the military does seem to provide is a road to opportunity.

Would you agree?

Brandon: Absolutely.

That’s one of the things I’ve really grown to appreciate about the military.

If you meet the qualifications, it doesn’t really matter where you came from economically, religiously, or otherwise.

You can use the benefits available to you to improve your circumstances.

I’m not saying it’s a get-rich-quick scheme.

You definitely earn it.

But in my case, I’ve been able to move myself into a higher economic position than where I started.

That came through a number of things.

There’s the steady income, but there are also many different benefits.

Some of those benefits can last a lifetime.

There may be veterans discounts.

Depending on your circumstances, you may have access to VA medical care.

There are education benefits such as the GI Bill.

I transferred my GI Bill benefit to my son because I was able to use tuition assistance to complete my own degrees.

There are so many benefits available that you could spend a lifetime trying to catalog and use all of them.

Tony: That’s incredible.

Of course, military service comes with a price as well.

But I live in Alameda, which is home to Coast Guard Island, so I know quite a few Coast Guard members.

A lot of them received advanced training through their service and developed valuable skills they were able to use later.

Brandon: Absolutely.

At a minimum, I think military service gives you perspective and appreciation.

I’ve definitely become more appreciative of being an American, living where we do, and having freedoms and opportunities that aren’t available everywhere.

Tony: That’s something that has come up with guests from around the world too.

Sometimes we forget how fortunate we are to have certain things.

There are places where things such as indoor plumbing, having regular meals, or having reliable housing aren’t things people can take for granted.

That gets into the financial journey and how we define financial success.

We may think we need X, Y, and Z to be financially successful.

But if we can take care of our family, meet our needs, have transportation, a roof over our heads, and a hot shower, we’re doing pretty well compared with a lot of the world.

It raises the question: What is your definition of financial success?

Brandon: Yes.

And that’s something you can take for granted in the military too.

You may always have had housing provided, food provided, and medical care.

Then when you leave the military, suddenly you have to shop for health care.

You don’t receive a housing stipend anymore.

All of those things can feel very different.

Tony: Definitely.

Let’s switch gears and talk about financial predators.

A friend of mine was involved with legislation around VA benefits and opened my eyes to how much predatory activity can target military members.

Why are service members such prime targets?

Brandon: I think it boils down to a few things.

First, as we mentioned, you generally have a younger population.

Young people may not understand all the financial details or may have more of a “you only live once” mentality.

That was certainly me.

“I’ll figure it out later.”

But later always eventually becomes today.

Second, I think military members can sometimes be more trusting of processes.

You’re accustomed to being told, “This is the way it is,” and then following the process.

So when someone says, “This is how you buy a car,” or, “This is how this financial product works,” you may simply accept it.

Third, some predatory businesses lean on military loyalty and connections.

You may have very well-meaning veterans or military spouses who get pulled into a system that encourages them to use what the industry calls their “natural market.”

They leverage their military affiliation to gain access to other service members.

So it’s a combination of factors.

Another issue is that military benefits themselves can be complicated and confusing.

I had never heard of the TSP.

I hadn’t heard of the GI Bill before joining.

If somebody seems friendly and says, “I can help you with all of this,” it can be easy to trust them.

Then you find out they were a former first sergeant or commander, and that creates even more built-in trust.

You think, “This person probably has my best interests in mind.”

Sometimes they do.

Sometimes they don’t.

And sometimes they may not even fully understand the product or system they’re selling themselves.

Tony: I think you nailed it.

I come from the life insurance world, and that’s something I’ve seen quite often.

People sell insurance products they don’t fully understand themselves.

That can be a problem.

I know it has happened in the military as well.

Someone finishes their service and becomes an insurance representative or financial professional serving military members.

That natural market makes sense.

Those are the people they know.

They understand military life and the planning challenges that come with it.

But as the saying goes, a little knowledge can be dangerous.

So before we get into strategies people can use to protect themselves, one thing I hear from you is: Don’t assume that because someone is a veteran, they’re automatically the right person to give you financial advice.

Does that make sense?

Brandon: Absolutely.

It stinks to have to say, “Pause if you’re doing business with somebody just because they’re a veteran.”

But the same thing applies in other industries.

Somebody may say, “I’m a former employee of XYZ company, so I know exactly how to help you.”

Military affiliation isn’t unique in that regard.

Ask yourself:

Would I still do business with this person if they weren’t a veteran?

If the answer is yes, that’s at least one useful check.

I also use something I call the pocket test.

And I tell people to convert everything to dollars.

The pocket test helps uncover where your money is going and the incentives behind what someone is recommending.

In the simplest form:

Can I understand how my money gets from my pocket, into this product or service, and then into the pocket of the person selling it to me?

If I understand that flow, it tells me a lot about whether the recommendation may actually be good for me.

I experienced this myself.

A person came into my recruiting station and said, “I’m a reserve officer with this unit. I really love helping military members with their money.”

At the time, my wife and I had just become debt-free.

I was excited about reaching this personal goal.

Looking back, I can see why his ears probably perked up.

He took me to breakfast and paid.

He seemed like a really nice guy.

Then he started explaining his approach.

Basically, the pitch was:

“Don’t invest in your TSP. Invest with our company.”

“You’re probably underinsured.”

There were various recommendations.

The only reason I didn’t sign up was because I asked one simple question:

“You say all of this is free to me. How do you actually get paid?”

I knew he wasn’t doing it for free.

He had a family.

That’s when the dance started.

He either couldn’t or wouldn’t clearly explain how he was paid.

He said, “Sometimes some products I recommend might pay me a little bit.”

He never used the word “commission.”

But everything he did was commission-based.

I talked it over with my wife, and her intuition was better than mine.

She said, “Let’s not do this.”

Looking back now, I know I would likely have ended up in loaded mutual funds and expensive life insurance products I didn’t need or understand.

That’s a whole other conversation.

And most service members don’t even fully understand the life insurance benefits they already have.

Tony: Life insurance is tough.

As you know, that’s my subject-matter expertise.

I’ve been trying for decades to warn people to be careful about the life insurance policies they purchase.

They can be expensive.

They can carry high commissions.

They may not provide the value someone expects.

I’ve had a tough time breaking through on this.

Maybe life insurance just seems boring on the surface.

But as you point out, it can be incredibly complex.

Any ideas about how to get people to pay attention to boring financial products?

Brandon: I think it’s going to take more conversation.

Unfortunately, it may also take some high-profile cases before more attention gets paid to some of these problems.

There are organizations trying to provide better alternatives and educate people.

That’s one reason I’ve tried to be involved with the MQFP program.

There are also consumer organizations trying to help people understand financial products.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has done a lot of work providing educational resources.

There’s also the Military Lending Act and other protections.

Those are good starts.

But nothing is perfect.

As long as the financial incentives exist, there will always be people trying to take advantage of others.

Staying informed and educated is really important.

And anybody listening to this podcast is already ahead of a lot of people because they’re trying to educate themselves.

Tony: Definitely.

I want to give a shout-out to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

There are a lot of resources there on borrowing, savings accounts, and many other financial issues.

You mentioned MQFP.

What is that?

Brandon: That’s the Military Qualified Financial Planner designation.

It essentially identifies professionals who meet certain standards around fiduciary service, compensation structure, military experience or education, and baseline professional credentials.

Professionals may hold credentials such as the CFP, ChFC, AFC, or certain other professional qualifications.

The idea is to provide a kind of guidepost toward professionals who understand military financial issues and genuinely want to help.

Tony: That’s like anything else.

I always recommend finding someone with appropriate background and qualifications.

If you were taking your car in for repair, would you go to a random person on the side of the road who says they can fix it?

Or would you look for a trained, certified mechanic with relevant experience and reviews?

Yet with financial services, people often turn to family, friends, or someone they know through work without thinking twice.

Brandon: Absolutely.

Another challenge is that there’s a lot of hype around different financial strategies.

A common example in the military community is somebody saying:

“Use your VA loan.”

“House hack.”

“Become a landlord.”

Those strategies can work.

But many of the gurus promoting them don’t necessarily have formal financial training.

Some may have an interesting personal story.

But you have to ask:

Is their story the story I want to make mine?

Do I want to follow their path?

Is their path repeatable?

A lot of real estate gurus built portfolios when interest rates were extremely low.

You may not be able to repeat that exact journey under today’s conditions.

So you have to come back to:

Is this actually something I need to do to accomplish my goals?

And many people haven’t clearly defined those goals or why those goals matter in the first place.

Tony: I think that really needs to be emphasized.

Start with your goals.

Where are you trying to go?

Instead of looking at the product first and saying, “Should I do this real estate deal?” ask:

“Does this even fit my goals?”

And even before that:

“How do I feel about this?”

“What’s the full story?”

There are often factors behind someone else’s success that you don’t see.

As we start to close out, what is one action listeners can take to guard against financial predators?

Brandon: Ask questions.

Make sure you understand what you’re investing in and what products you’re buying.

And pause when somebody finds you and tries to sell you something.

That doesn’t automatically mean the product is bad.

But ask:

“What is their incentive?”

“What’s the benefit to me?”

“If they hadn’t contacted me, would I even be looking for this product or service?”

A common sales tactic is:

“You don’t realize you have this problem.”

“Actually, it’s a huge problem.”

“And I’m the only person who can solve it.”

Then they sell you the product or service.

Military members should also understand their benefits.

Start researching what you already have.

That applies to everybody.

Understand what resources and protections are already available.

I spoke with Kathy Stokes from AARP about scams, and she talked about how veterans are specifically targeted because they have steady paychecks and valuable benefits.

There are entire companies built around helping veterans access benefits.

One thing veterans should understand is that you generally do not need to pay a private company simply to file for or access VA benefits.

If somebody is telling you that you must pay them just to access benefits you’re entitled to, that should be a major red flag.

Tony: That’s great advice.

It gets back to what we’ve been talking about.

Know how these systems work.

For people watching and listening, you can also check out my recent episode on the habits of highly effective scammers.

We get into some of these tactics, including isolation and creating the impression that “I’m the only one who can solve your problem.”

Scammers are very good at what they do.

Your best protection is asking questions, staying curious, and sticking to what you are trying to accomplish rather than what somebody else wants to sell you.

Brandon: Absolutely.

And have some Spidey sense about whether somebody is leveraging a connection that really shouldn’t be leveraged in that way.

Tony: That’s great advice.

To close out, I have what’s called the Get Ready Hot Take Trio.

These are three quick questions I ask all my guests.

The first one is: What money myth are you trying to break?

Brandon: Probably the biggest money myth I’m trying to break is that everything has to be complicated.

Money can actually be pretty simple.

I really enjoy living a simple life.

You don’t have to over-index and over-optimize everything.

You can ignore most of the noise in the news and media and focus on:

“What is my goal?”

“What do I want my life to look like?”

“What do I need financially to accomplish that?”

Then let those answers guide what you do with your money.

I think it’s a much simpler way to live.

It helps you avoid the constant treadmill of:

“Here’s the new hot thing.”

“Now here’s the next hot thing.”

Otherwise, at the end of the day you may be exhausted and still not where you actually wanted to be.

Tony: That reminds me of something coaches used to tell me when I played basketball:

Focus on your own game.

Do what you’re supposed to do.

Follow your game plan.

Don’t spend all your time worrying about what everybody else is doing.

Brandon: Exactly.

And to take that analogy further, the best basketball players on Earth master the fundamentals consistently.

They do the basics extremely well, forever.

They keep honing those fundamentals.

I think the same thing is true with finances.

If you can master cash flow, consistently save and invest, and live within your means, you’re doing the fundamentals.

When I build financial plans for people, the people who often end up becoming millionaires are simply the ones who consistently did the right things for 20, 30, or 40 years.

They saved and invested consistently.

They end up in a fantastic financial position without making themselves miserable along the way.

Tony: It can be hard to do that.

But as you say, it’s about fundamentals.

I’m in the Bay Area, so we’ve gotten to watch a lot of Steph Curry.

If you watch videos of him training, you see the incredible number of shots he takes in practice.

He has tremendous talent, but he has also worked incredibly hard to maximize that talent.

You’re probably not going to become Steph Curry.

But if you consistently work at something, you can get pretty good.

Brandon: Exactly.

There are a lot of NBA players whose names most people don’t know.

They’re still professional basketball players doing pretty well.

Tony: Let’s get out the time machine for a minute.

What would you tell your younger self if you could go back in time knowing what you know now about money?

Brandon: I would say two things.

Stay away from debt.

You don’t understand yet how it works or what it’s going to do to your future.

And start investing as soon as you can because you can’t afford not to.

Tony: That’s fantastic advice.

Getting started early is something we hear from a lot of guests.

To wrap up, what is your number one tip for changing the way we think about money?

Brandon: Understand the purpose money serves in your life.

I see money as a medium for exchanging our life energy for other things.

You also need to distinguish between things that are guaranteed and things you hope will happen.

Make plans based on what you can actually count on.

I have a concept I call:

Debt is definite. Gains aren’t guaranteed.

Sometimes we get wrapped up in thinking, “If I do X, then this could happen.”

But when you enter into a debt contract, you’re legally obligated to fulfill that contract.

That helped shape the way I think about money.

It isn’t just some abstract thing.

“I’m legally obligated to pay this back.”

Every time I swipe a card, I’m entering into a financial obligation.

Tony: That’s great advice.

I think that’s something we lose track of in a mostly cashless society.

It’s one thing to physically hand over dollar bills.

It’s different when all you have to do is tap your card.

We went to a farmers market recently.

You buy bread here, some meat there, a few things somewhere else, and suddenly you’ve tapped your card quite a few times in a short period.

Brandon: Exactly.

And now there’s also the creep of tipping being added almost everywhere.

I’m terrible about that.

My wife gets on me because I’ll just hit the button, sign, and go.

She’ll ask, “Why did you tip for that?”

And I’ll say, “I don’t know. There was a button there.”

Tony: There’s psychology involved there too.

Somebody is looking at you.

For me, it can be very hard not to tip when someone is standing there watching.

You start spending another 10% or 15% because of that social pressure.

That makes these decisions harder.

Brandon: Absolutely.

There’s also a time-pressure component.

When you’re pressed for time or dealing with some other immediate emotional issue, you tend to make less optimal money decisions.

We don’t always make great decisions in the heat of the moment unless we’ve predetermined how we’re going to respond.

Tony: That’s something I’d recommend for almost any financial situation: prepare.

If you’re going to buy a car, for example, do your homework before you walk in.

Time pressure can lead to poor decision-making.

Brandon, where can listeners learn more about you, your work with Enlisted Money, and the resources you’ve created for service members?

Brandon: The number one place is EnlistedMoney.com.

The other place where I’m putting out the most content right now is my YouTube channel.

If you go to the website, you’ll find links to everything else, so you can consume the content in whatever format works best for you.

Tony: Fantastic.

For everybody watching and listening, if you have access to the show notes, all of those links will be there.

Brandon, thanks for joining us on Get Ready: Before Life Happens.

Brandon: I really appreciate you having me.

Tony: This was fun. I appreciate your insights.

And thank you, everyone, as always, for tuning in to Get Ready: Before Life Happens.

If this episode helped you change the way you think about money, please be sure to subscribe and share it with a friend.

You can also go to my website at TonySteuer.com to join the Get Ready Movement and get access to free resources.

Until next time, let’s change the way we think about money.