It was all about families and finance during the most recent episode of Fried On Business. We had the privilege of speaking with two fabulous guests about generational wealth and how to create a financial legacy for your loved ones.
For instance, the words women, wealth and power usually aren’t part of the same sentence in our culture. But that’s changing, and Carol Pepper is helping to change it.
Pepper is the CEO and Founder of Pepper International, LLC, a family office and consulting firm located in New York City. She acts as External Chief Investment Officer for ultra-high net worth, multi-generational families around the globe and acts as a consultant to build family offices globally.
She is also the co-author with Camilla Webster of The Seven Pearls of Financial Wisdom: A Woman’s Guide to Enjoying Wealth and Power, an award-winning Amazon best seller.
Pepper said she and Webster realized that although women are starting to out-earn their husbands and becoming the breadwinners in the household, they tend to be intimidated by money and lack solid guidance from a woman’s perspective.
So the duo interviewed more than 60 financial experts, including Warren Buffet’s sister Doris, to glean some sound advice for the fairer sex. Advice such as:
– Get on a budget. By the way, wealthy people need a budget, too.
– Require good finance in your romance. Money issues are the No. 1 cause of divorce in the U.S., Pepper said. And only 20% of couples discuss money if they get married the second time.
– Raise your kids to be wealthy. Teach them wise principles for money management.
Pepper said men and women tend to think very differently about money:
– Women tend to think holistically about the impact of financial changes on their families.
– Women tend to lack familiarity with the technical language of money. Words like “standard deviation” and “Sharpe Ratio” raise defenses instead of raising understanding.
Guys, that second point is where you come in, Pepper said. The greatest expression of love you can give to your wife and family is to make sure she understands the family finances and can operate things prudently if something happens to you.
Now, Pepper is a family office expert, so I had to ask how does a family know when it needs the structure that a family office provides.
Well, a successful business is a good indicator, she said. Too often, the business starts producing cash flow, and the family is so busy running the business that they manage the wealth poorly.
Or, they sell the business – with the same result.
If your net worth is between $20 million and $30 million above and beyond the value of the business, it probably time to start looking at a family office, Pepper said.
And you don’t have to go it alone, she added. There are professionals available whose sole business is to assemble and coordinate all of the professionals you’d need to manage your wealth.
Click here to listen to the full interview with Carol Pepper of Pepper International. You can learn more about her book online at thesevenpearls.com.
Leaving a legacy
Our second guest, John Bennardo, is President of Legacy Builders in New York. The company was built on one foundational idea, he said: Creating a legacy that survives him. That is, doing something that’s larger than himself and will continue to help his family in the generations to come.
Bennardo credits the legacy mentality to his immigrant upbringing. His grandparents, who came to the U.S. from Italy, instilled in the family a sense of obligation to leave other people and the world a little better than you found them.
“Somebody could say, ‘Hey, that guy made an impact on my life,’ whether it was through something I said or a company I built. That’s really what I believe is my obligation to my family,” he said.
Legacy Builders handles commercial office buildouts, multifamily residential development, and large renovation projects. Here in Miami, they built a 55,000-square-foot office for WeWork on Lincoln Road.
Reputation is everything, Bennardo said, and maintaining it means a willingness to do whatever it takes – whether that’s flying a crew thousands of miles to do finish work or taking a call from a client on a holiday weekend.
The result is solid personal and business relationships that stand the test of time.
“It’s okay to have a disagreement or an argument. This is business. This is life. Things don’t always go 100 percent well. But as long as you’re fair with each other, you can move on to the next one, dust yourself off, and kind of smile about it – and maybe have a beer one day,” he said.
One of Legacy Builders’ crowning achievements, Bennardo said, was the interior buildout of the trendy Zuma restaurant on Madison Avenue in New York City. It was a huge “vanity play,” he said, and a chance to be a part of something far out of the ordinary.
“Nothing makes you more proud, besides taking care of my family, than sitting in Zuma and saying, ‘Wow, this is just really an awesome place, and I did a fantastic job – or my people did a fantastic job.’
“And it’s not just that I looks beautiful. It’s who was there with me at 2 o’clock in the morning when we had the fire alarm inspection. It’s who sacrificed their Labor Day weekend because the restaurant had to open. It’s who worked a double-shift, and who I had to put up in a hotel because they were committed to the process,” he said.
“That’s the key. I can’t build all of these jobs myself. It’s having people in and out of the family that are as committed to the process as I am.”
Click here to listen to the full interview with John Bennardo of Legacy Builders. Visit legacybd.com to learn more about the company.
