Financial Infidelity: Red Flags to Look Out for in a Marriage with Tracy Coenen

Eric Brotman: [00:00:00] Welcome to Don’t Retire, Graduate, the podcast that
asks you what you want to be when you grow up so you can graduate into
retirement with purpose and passion. I’m your host and valedictorian, Eric
Brotman, and we have a fantastic fun guest today, Tracy Coenen. She has been
investigating fraud- now work with me, this doesn’t sound fun, but it will be.
She’s been investigating fraud for more than 25 years. But she hasn’t always
wanted to be a forensic accountant. She had a dream of being a prison warden–
true story. She went to Marquette University in Milwaukee to get a criminology
degree and a class on financial crime in investigations reminded her how much
she loved Encyclopedia Brown books as a kid, and she continued her
criminology degree, but added accounting and economics courses so she could
sit for her CPA exam. And now she’s finding money in cases of corporate fraud,
high net worth divorce and other financial [00:01:00] shenanigans, and there’s
nothing I enjoy more than shenanigans.
Tracy, welcome to Don’t Retire, Graduate.
Tracy Coenen: Thank you for having me, Eric. That was a fabulous
introduction, but now you’ve set the stage and now I feel like I have to be
interesting and exciting.
Eric Brotman: Well, listen, that’s the only way we do things on this show. I, I
want this to be fun. I want it to be lively. And when you think about a guest
coming on to talk about divorce your, your immediate reaction is, Oh no.
Like, do I really wanna listen to that? And yet, I know you’ve got some
interesting stories and I know we can talk about financial infidelity, which is
only one kind of infidelity that sometimes leads to the Big D, but nonetheless
tell, tell us a little bit about you. And certainly we know about your academic
background, but the things that got you excited about what you do, and then we
can dive into some, maybe some stories.
Tracy Coenen: Forensic accounting in general is exciting to me because it’s
putting a puzzle together.
You know, it’s taking the numbers, sorting things out. I, of [00:02:00] course
like to be the expert, but I like to give clarity to people and help them unravel
something and figure it out. And so I always tell people, as a forensic
accountant, I find money. So that involves, you know, tracing funds through
bank accounts and investment accounts to figure out where it went. In the
context of divorce we have spouses who are concerned about what their spouse
has been doing with the money. Where has the money been going? Is there a
secret account somewhere? Has there been an affair partner? Is there other
spending that I don’t know about, wouldn’t approve of? And how do I get what I
should be getting financially in the divorce?
So it might not sound exciting to other people, but to me it is exciting to help
bring clarity to that.
Eric Brotman: Well, finding the money does sound exciting. I channel my, my
inner Jerry McGuire with finding me the money and I we’re gonna talk about
that too, but you know, is this something, just first and foremost, I have to ask,
is this something that you see more, one [00:03:00] gender or the other doing?
Or are the shenanigans a two-way street and it’s an equal opportunity
shenanigan?
Tracy Coenen: There is certainly equal opportunity to do shenanigans and men
and women are both guilty of it. In my practice, however, I work more often
with women and I find that women are more often the ones in need of services
and support because even though we’ve come a long way with things, it is still
overwhelmingly the men who are in charge of the money in the marriage.
And what I’m finding is that women are being hands off with the money. We
trust our spouses, we divide duties in the marriage, and so I might drop the kids
off at school. You might mow the lawn, I might pick up the dry cleaning. You
might be responsible for our budget, and we kind of each do our own thing.
So the wife is, you know, remaining hands off with the money. And then
[00:04:00] if, God forbid, they get divorced, she’s saying, “oh my goodness, I
have no idea what he’s been doing with the money”.
Eric Brotman: There are only two ways a marriage can end. Literally. There
are only two ways. There’s deathTracy Coenen: Divorce, and death!
Eric Brotman: And there’s divorce. I’m not sure which one’s worse. I, I’ve been
through one and not the other. I’ll let you decide which one I’ve been through.
But, but I’ve been through one and not the other. And…. it is, it is horrible
actually, when a, when a marriage ends, it’s, it’s, it, it, even under amicable
circumstances, it’s difficult.
It’s painful, especially if there are children. And a lot of it doesn’t revolve
around the assets- though certainly it’s a, that plays a role and the income,
especially in a single a single earner household where that becomes a, a hot
potato. But, if, if I’m not mistaken, in our world as financial advisors, what we
see is close to 75% of the women in marriages are actually handling most of the
day-to-day [00:05:00] finances.
So and I’m not suggesting shenanigans aren’t possible. Of course they are. In
fact, there have been situations where one spouse or another has had an account
and has not shared that transparently. But generally speaking I tend to find that
the, the, the wives are paying most of the bills and handling most of the day-today, whether they’re working or not.
And I think that’s a shift from, from years ago.
Tracy Coenen: Well, and it’s a shift from what I’m seeing, and so I’m
wondering ifEric Brotman: Interesting.
Tracy Coenen: First of all, my experience is skewed because I’m really having
contact with the people who are feeling victimized and you know, that’s not a
fair sampling. But I also wonder if your experience isn’t skewed as well because
the type of clients that you attract are maybe more likely to be women and more
likely to be very financially savvy. Thus, they are taking control of the money in
the families. And so I don’t know that either of our experience is [00:06:00]
necessarily representative of society, but I will tell you that the research out
there tells me that women are less likely to be in charge of the money in the
families.
Eric Brotman: Interesting. And, and maybe that is one of the things that, that
differentiates our, our firm and what we do in that we do insist that both spouses
are involved in these conversations and, and that there is transparency and
knowledge and sharing and and, and, and just in my own household, and I’m,
I’m not here for divorce advice- heaven forbid- but in my own household my
wife doesn’t want anything to do with the finances.
In fact, I will periodically say, would you like to sit down and go through this?
We, we have our own financial advisor. One of my, my partners here in the firm
does our financial advising, cuz I think a second set of eyes is good for anyone.
She has no interest at all. Like literally just says, “just tell me I’m gonna be okay
and who to call if something goes wrong with you”.
And, and that’s it. And so is that a sign of just a [00:07:00] healthy marriage and
a healthy partnership and that’s great? Or is that abdicating responsibility and
setting herself up for, if I was nefarious, it would be easy to take advantage of–
like, what is your advice to someone like my wife? And, and yes, we’ll take free
advice now- where she, she literally has no interest at all and just wants to
know, number one, she’s okay no matter what happens to me. And number two,
she knows who to call if the worst happens.
Tracy Coenen: Well, I think that it’s fabulous that she trusts you to that level. I
also think it’s very dangerous. I talk to people about going into marriage and
protecting themselves financially, and by turning a blind eye to the finances,
you’re really not protecting yourself.
I would advise her to have a monthly check-in with you about the finances. In
advance of that monthly check-in, I would have her look at your bank
statements, your investment account statements, and your credit card
statements. Just give them a glance, literally five minutes or less, just so she can
be familiar with what’s been going on.
And [00:08:00] also to keep you honest. If you know she’s looking and you can’t
get one by her, that’ll keep you honest. So five minutes to look at the statements
and a five to 10 minute check-in with you once a month where you guys talk
about- you know that car that we’re planning on getting next year, here’s where
we are on our savings goals or budget was pretty normal this week, but I have to
let you know the heating bill was outta control. By meeting regularly it takes a
lot of the pressure off the money conversations. If you have one big money
conversation a year- it’s a huge deal, there’s a lot of anxiety. But if you’re
meeting weekly or monthly and it becomes routine, there’s so much less
pressure around it. That’s what I’d recommend her to do.
Eric Brotman: It’s funny because that would be kind of fun for me, actually, to
have that kind of dialogue because I, I love this stuff. This is what I do for a
living. I find it fascinating. I enjoy it. I think she’d rather get a monthly root
canal, than do that. [00:09:00] And, and I’m delighted to offer. In fact, now I
have to because now you’re, you’re keeping me honest with, with our whole
audience.
And I’m happy to do it. I just don’t think she’ll do it. I think she’ll say “thank
you, but I would, I would rather do anything else”. And and I, I don’t think she’s
alone. I think there’s a fair amount of that where the divide and conquer routine
between two partners, whether it’s mar, whether it’s marriage, whether it’s
domestic partnerships, whether it’s any, any two people who are living together.
I, I, I think there’s a tendency to divide and conquer a little bit, and money is
something that there’s a great disadvantage to being the spouse who’s not aware
of what’s coming and going and how it works. It’s a enormous disadvantage.
Tracy Coenen: Can I be your therapist right now?
Eric Brotman: I mean, I always accept therapy. Just don’t send me an invoice.
Tracy Coenen: What’s stopping you from insisting that you do something like
this?
Eric Brotman: I don’t insist on anything. JustTracy Coenen: okay
Eric Brotman: in keep in keeping the peace. I’m not one of those people who
says it’s gonna be this way and this isn’t. I always offer. [00:10:00] There’s,
there’s, it, it, it is available 24/7.
Like, I’m delighted to have this conversation, and if she were to approach me
this afternoon and say, “Hey, can we look at some stuff?” The answer would be,
“absolutely. I can’t wait.” First of all, I can’t wait to share it with her because the
news is really good. But nonetheless, if, you know, I, I think for some couples,
for some couples where there’s a spending issue or a debt issue or, or there’s
some shame and embarrassment around money a lot of times.
Or or there’s help going to one of your grown kids and you don’t want your
spouse to know that you’re helping to that extent. I mean, there’s some of those
things that aren’t nefarious divorce, you know, type of of events, but they are
they are often not shared. I, I, I don’t think I can insist on this.
I think I can say “I’m delighted. Let’s do it. Let’s sit down. Would you like to sh
would you like to see it?” I know she’s gonna say “no, thank you”. And she
might not even say thank you. She might just say “Absolutely not”.
Tracy Coenen: I personally think that there’s a way to reframe it. If this is
something that you need to have happen to feel good about the [00:11:00]
money in your marriage.
That’s a different way of framing it. So it’s not about her. It’s about, “I need this
to feel okay with it. I’m not sleeping well at night knowing that if I passed away
tomorrow, you wouldn’t even know where our money is. Yes, we have people to
call who will help you, and I’m happy that that’s set up for you, but I don’t sleep
well at night knowing that you wouldn’t know where to begin with the finances.
Eric Brotman: Okay. No, that, that’s, that’s a, that’s true. That’s entirely true.
And I, I will give this a whirl and next time I see you, which I think is gonna be
in Louisiana later this year, I will tell you all about how it went. How’s that?
Tracy Coenen: I would, I would like hearing about that. Absolutely.
Eric Brotman: Okay. No, listen, I, I, I’m gonna give it a whirl and we’ll see
what happens. I’m gonna try and reframe this. So let’s talk about red flags. Let’s
talk about the things that maybe you see your spouse or significant other doing
that should cause one eyebrow to go up.
Tracy Coenen: Right?
Eric Brotman: What, what are those [00:12:00] kinds of things, particularly if
financial infidelity, I mean, certainly there’s lots of flags of other kinds of
infidelity, but let’s talk about the financial piece. What are some of the things
that should cause anyone to take a pause and go, “Hmm, I wanna look at that
again”.
Tracy Coenen: Financial infidelity is any dishonesty about the money– lying
about what you’re spending, being secretive about your spending, violating
agreements that you and your spouse have about money, things like that.
There is literally a laundry list of red flags that I could go through, but if we talk
about some of the most common signs that should cause someone to say, “is
financial infidelity happening in my marriage?” It would include things like:
becoming more secretive about money issues that might be spending secretly.
You know, you find a charge on the credit card for something weird that your
spouse never told you about, or terribly expensive that your spouse never told
you about. Becoming more controlling over the finances. And that might be,
you know, [00:13:00] controlling what your spouse is allowed to spend or
questioning them heavily about what they spent, things like that.
Things like just changes in behavior, especially if it involves becoming more
secretive about behavior, maybe more secretive of one’s whereabouts, more
protective of the phone. And, and some of these things are heavily related to
having affairs. But sometimes it’s not. Sometimes it might be related to
something else- like gambling or drugs or pornography addiction or buying a
secret piece of real estate that you’re not telling your spouse about because you
are thinking divorce is on the horizon and I wanna make sure that he or she
doesn’t get a piece of that real estate.
Eric Brotman: Interesting. And you’re seeing all of these kinds of things and
you get to be the detective. You get to do the forensic evaluation and, and what
does that involve? What I don’t, I don’t want to get a forensic accounting degree
in the next eight minutes or so, but what I would like to do is understand what
that [00:14:00] means and the kinds of things that you do on a, on a case by case
basis, of course, but to, to find the money.
What are the things that you do, and more importantly maybe, what are the
things that the average Joe, who maybe isn’t a forensic accountant can do to sort
of begin that process on our own?
Tracy Coenen: You’re speaking my language, Eric. To do the process on your
own is so important.
Eric Brotman: Yeah.
Tracy Coenen: But as a forensic accountant, it’s, I’m tracing money through
accounts, so I’m literally looking at every transaction on a bank statement, on a
credit card statement, investment account statement.
And figuring out where did that money go? What was it spent on? The vast
majority of the transactions that I’m gonna look at in your bank account are
gonna be pretty straightforward. You paid the mortgage, you made a car
payment, you went grocery shopping, all of those kinds of things. So what
catches my eye are the unusual transactions: a cash withdrawal of $10,000 from
your bank account; a period of time when you know, I maybe saw [00:15:00]
that you and your spouse typically visited an ATM and took out a few hundred
bucks cash once a month just for some little bit of money in your pocket to walk
around with, and now all of a sudden, Eric, I see you going to an ATM
personally and taking out 500 bucks at a time three times a week and doing this
week after week after week.
That’s a change in behavior that is suspicious to me. Or potentially transferring
money to a bank account that your spouse didn’t know you had. Those are the
kinds of things I’m keying in on to see if there’s missing money. But as an
individual who’s not a forensic accountant, what could you do? I teach some
really, really easy techniques in the Divorce Money guide.
Eric Brotman: Okay.
Tracy Coenen: I call it do it yourself forensic accounting, but you don’t have to
be a forensic accountant. You don’t even have to be good with numbers. Here’s
a great example. I tell you “go ahead and get 12 months of bank statements for
your main account and take a highlighter and go through those bank statements
and highlight every [00:16:00] paycheck that you see being deposited to your
account. Most people get paid 24 or 26 times a month [year]. Count up those
deposits and see how many there are. If you see that there were 20 paychecks
deposited over the last year, Houston, you have a problem. Or if you see these
paychecks suddenly decrease in the amount where maybe part of the paycheck
is being siphoned off somewhere. Super easy and you don’t have to have any
special forensic accounting knowledge to count up how many paychecks there
were, do you?
Eric Brotman: No, no, generally not. That’s arithmetic. And that we can all
generally do. Now what about folks who have significant cash transactions,
people who are in the tipped economy perhaps, or, or folks in whatever
whatever line of work where there’s gonna be cash transactions, where it might
not be at quite as easy to track, you know, the folks with the safe, with cash at
home kind of thing? Are you taking inventory in there? Are you having folks,
you know, make sure they have access to that regularly? What about those kinds
of situations?
Tracy Coenen: Cash [00:17:00] transactions are really hard. If you are going
through a divorce and you’re trying to prove how much your spouse is making
and they’re receiving cash either legitimately because they have a tipped kind of
job or illegitimately because they’re receiving cash under the table instead of a
paycheck- it really is a problem for the divorce situation. If there is a stash of
cash at home, I do certainly recommend that the spouse take that inventory on a
regular basis. Yes, literally go and count that cash that’s in that safe or under
that mattress. And, you know, keep track of, keep, make a list for yourself with
dates and how much you verified was there.
But ultimately, if that cash disappears into thin air, good luck trying to, getting
it, trying to get it back.
Eric Brotman: So that’s there therein lies one of the challenges. Certainly to do
accounting where there aren’t records is incredibly difficult. Now, I guess one
could figure out when there, when new things show up, if a car shows up at
home and there was no transaction for it that would be sort of an obvious event.
But some of it’s gotta be a lot less [00:18:00] obvious. There has to be there
have to be folks who are, who are keeping that from spouses. How do you, how
do you suggest- and, and this will be fun because I have kind of a strong
opinion on the subject- but how do you suggest married people title their bank
accounts?
Tracy Coenen: Ooh, I talk about this in one of my products. You know, I give
people three options. You can keep your money completely separate, you can
combine it all, or you can do a little bit of each, where you have some money
combined in a joint account and you have some in separate accounts. Honestly,
I think that last option is the most advisable because I think it’s important for
each spouse to have money of their own that is safe, is only in their name, only
accessible to them. Now, I don’t advise that that is a secret account, that that is
secret money, but it’s just separate money.
Eric Brotman: Interesting. You know, we normally encourage married couples
to have their bank accounts titled jointly, but to have each spouse [00:19:00] be
the primary account holder on one of the two accounts, so that essentially you’re
the only one with the ATM card on that account, each spouse has their own.
There’s a statement separate for the accounts, but they’re titled jointly in the
event you need to transfer money between accounts easily or there’s, there’s
some other need or somebody, somebody dies and it’s immediately yours. I
know you can do that with a beneficiary designation. It’s interesting that you’re
suggesting that there be some individual accounts.
We certainly see that. And, and that more or less is a comfort level for, for
folks. You know, the, the old joke that what’s hers is hers and what’s mine is
hers sometimes does apply. I get that. But there are also- we, we’ve worked with
lots of couples where particularly the non-working spouse wants to have an
account in his or her name, and I, I’m sure it has to do with access and safety. It
must.
Tracy Coenen: Well, certainly I’m jaded given all the divorce work that I do,
but I can’t tell you how often I see scenarios where, a married couple has all of
their money together in a [00:20:00] joint account. They decide they’re going to
separate and get divorced. And you know, both of them are looking at the bank
account and saying, okay, we’ve got, you know, $25,000 sitting in the account.
Good. Bills are gonna be paid for a period of time, and two days later, one
spouse cleans out that account and the non-working spouse is left with nothing.
Now they can go to court. They can get a court order eventually to have funds
returned to them, but in the meantime, how do they eat? How do they pay for an
apartment if they’re the one who has to move out of the house?
Things like this. So having that separate account that only you can access can be
very, very important, especially in those scenarios where divorce is a potential.
Eric Brotman: Interesting. All right. Well, that’s not the most uplifting thing
I’ve heard today, but it, it is logical and it certainly makes sense. If, if you get
the sense that your spouse is hiding money from you, either because of the red
flags, the, the paychecks that are missing or, or things like that.[00:21:00]
Or if you are just questioning if you have full transparency, what do you do?
What is the first, is the first step to talk to your spouse and say, “Hey, I’m
feeling uncomfortable with this”?
Tracy Coenen: Oh gosh no.
Eric Brotman: If you’re really uncomfortable do you n-, right? So, because
that’s gonna raise the, that’s gonna raise Defcon there too, right?
So if you’re really feeling this is a possibility, you don’t want to say anything
cuz then that’ll just ratchet up the secrecy, right? So what do you do? What do
you do?
Tracy Coenen: Well, I’ve got, I’ve got two things you can do because you’re
listening to this podcast and hearing me, you can go to my website,
fraudcoach.com, and at the very top of the page, there is a link to a red flag
assessment.
It’s 15 questions. It’ll take you about three or four minutes to go through these
questions. And I ask you things about you know, how do you and your spouse
manage the money in your household and the ways that you have things set up.
And then I’ll ask you some questions about what kinds of things have you seen
in your marriage?
And some of those are those red flag types of things. Have you seen certain
[00:22:00] secrecy? Did you one day find out that there was a bank account you
never knew anything about? Things like this. You get through the 15 questions
and you’ll have returned to your result of how likely it is that there is financial
fraud in your marriage.
And so I found that assessment was really, really important because when you
are in your marriage and in your situation, it’s really hard to know, should I be
worried or not? I find that people either really minimize what’s going on and
make excuses for their spouse, or they panic immediately. They see one thing
and they panic and they go, you know, way far to the other end of the spectrum.
And so this to me was an objective way to assess what was going on financially.
Eric Brotman: Does that create an email report of some kind that then might
also be seen by a spouse? If you’re really trying, I guess you have to use a, a
separate email account and now you’re, you’re, I mean, I, I, I don’t, I don’t think
like this, like I, I’m, I’m not.
I am [00:23:00] not accustomed to thinking about ways to hide things
necessarily. But if you were going to do that, you certainly wouldn’t want it in
some kind of shared email address or on some text message that somebody’s
gonna see. It would have to be in a separate email address. So now, now I feel
like we’re coaching our audience on how to keep things from each other.
But at, at the end of the day, if you’re doing a fraud assessment, it’s because you
want that to be a private assessment. So how do you, how do you navigate that?
How do you, how, how do you maintain the trust for your spouse that, that all of
us hopefully have, -particularly entering a marriage, but hopefully during a
marriage- and still feel okay sort of poking that bear a little bit with an
assessment like that?
Tracy Coenen: The first step of the Divorce Money Guide is preparing for a
potential divorce. And one of the first things I talk about is getting a brand new
email address that your spouse doesn’t know about that you could use for
purposes of communicating with a divorce attorney if you end up going that
route.
And so, yes, I do think if you have concerns, right, if you have [00:24:00]
concerns that rise to level of you’re going to the internet and Googling things
like “financial infidelity”, “spouse hiding money”, things like that, you do have
some problems that you need to take seriously. So creating an email address that
is super private today is very, very important.
So I wanted to get back to the practical steps when you asked, what’s the first
thing you should do when you have the concerns? One of them isEric Brotman: okay, good, cause I’m coming back to this email thing. Okay.
Tracy Coenen: Yes.
Eric Brotman: I’m coming back to this email thing. Okay.
Tracy Coenen: But the next step is gathering information. So it, it’s about
starting to gather bank statements for the accounts that your name is on, that
you have legal access to.
It’s about running a credit report on yourself to find out what debts are out there
connected to your name. That’s really the first place that I tell people to go. Itthe place of start gathering information. Don’t say anything to your spouse yet
that you have suspicions. Don’t start asking questions just yet.
Eric Brotman: Would [00:25:00] you consider a credit freeze- just as a general
course of not necessarily to create a red flag, but to just protect yourself
anyway? It’s not a terrible thing to do anyway, but if you’re at that point where
you’re a little concerned, not only to pull that report, but also to freeze your
credit so nothing new can be added- would that be something you’d consider
too?
Tracy Coenen: I would consider that too, but don’t get overly confident in that
because the accounts that are already open can still be used even if you have the
credit freeze. So the credit freeze stops someone from being able to take new
accounts in your name, but it doesn’t stop them from using the accounts that
currently exist.
Eric Brotman: Got it. So let’s talk about this email address.
Tracy Coenen: Yes.
Eric Brotman: If you’re creating a separate private email address that you’re
not telling your spouse about, isn’t that its own form of infidelity?
Tracy Coenen: Absolutely not.
Eric Brotman: I mean aren’t weTracy Coenen: I, un really, unless you promised. Did you promise your spouse
“I will never create a new email address?” I don’t think you probably promised
that.
Eric Brotman: No. But if you are doing it specifically so that you can sort of
look these kinds of [00:26:00] things up. That, that feels, I don’t know, it, it, it
feels a little bit uncomfortable to me. The idea, and I don’t know if my wife has
accounts I don’t know about, and frankly, it’s fine if she does, because our
situation I’m comfortable with.
But if, if there were, if there were friction and that was a, an action taken and I
discovered that action or vice versa, I think that would feel like a shot across the
bow, no?
Tracy Coenen: I think it depends on the intent. If you were creating a separate
email address so you could carry on an affair with someone, that feels bad to
me.
If you’re creating a separate email address so that you can communicate
privately, gather information, and protect yourself financially because you think
that a divorce is potential, I don’t have any problem with it.
Eric Brotman: Okay. Interesting. No, I’m, I’m, thank you for the, the
clarification and the dichotomy. That is a it, it, this, this whole thing fascinates
me because I, I did go through a divorce. I got divorced on my [00:27:00] 28th
birthday. True story.
Tracy Coenen: Oh wow.
Eric Brotman: On my 28th birthday, I got divorced and we came up with a
property settlement that was very simple. I offered her everything and she took
it. And that way there was nothing to fight about. It’s li- God’s honest truth, and,
and it was because I wanted conflict to be nil. I wanted this to go as well as it
could.
Tracy Coenen: Sure.
Eric Brotman: So we could get on with our lives. We were young people. We
didn’t have children together. There was no, so, so it was, it was almost, I won’t
say it was easy cuz it was painful. It was really hard. But it was easier than it
would’ve been had we been in- intertwined forever by virtue of kids or
grandkids or other kinds of things that that’s a much, much heavier lift. SoTracy Coenen: It wasn’t easy, but the divorce was simple, right? There’s a
difference.
Eric Brotman: Yes, yes.
Tracy Coenen: It was simple not easy.
Eric Brotman: No that’s true. That’s true. And, and ultimately, you know, I’m
extremely empathetic for people going through divorces, especially, especially
when they’re whe when they’re not amicable. When they’re, when they’re truly
acrimonious.
It’s ugly. Oh my gosh. And everyone [00:28:00] loses. And the amount of
money spent, oh my goodness, on fighting each other in court over who gets
50% versus 52% custody and all this kind of stuff. The lawyers make a fortune.
And I think everybody gets hurt and the kids get hurt. And so I, I, I’m not a huge
fan of divorce.
I also understand that life happens and it is something that, that people have to
deal with in their lives as adult humans. So I, I, this has been fascinating. I, I
would love to spend more time with you because I, I find the, the inflection
point here of divorce and money or the, the the inflection- it’s just fascinating to
me. So this has been fun. Well, I, I have to ask you, I gotta ask you a couple of
questions though, because you’re not getting off this show without asking the,
with, without answering the tough ones. And then I’ll let you tell everybody
how to find your stuff. Deal?
Tracy Coenen: Okay. Deal.
Eric Brotman: All right, Tracy, I, I’ve known you for less than a year. I, but I, I
think you’re basically a grownup. So I have to ask you what you want to be
when you grow [00:29:00] up? What’s the next chapter for you?
Tracy Coenen: I wanna be a travel blogger. That’s right.
Eric Brotman: Nice.
Tracy Coenen: I want to travel the world, write about my adventures, and then
have, you know, these fancy luxury brands sponsor me at their properties, come
to our property blog and be a social media influencer. That’s if I ever grow up.
That’s what I’d like to do.
Eric Brotman: Why not start immediately?
Tracy Coenen: Because I’m too busy helping people navigate their divorces
and get every penny that they deserve.
Eric Brotman: Okay, I guess that’s good. Although if this is really a life’s a
life’s dream, start soon. Don’t wait. You know, none of us are promised
tomorrow. So if that’s something you really want to doTracy Coenen: That’s true.
Eric Brotman: Don’t quit your day job. Don’t quit your day job. But man, if
that’s really what you want to do, create the presence now and maybe start
taking those vacations. You never- TripAdvisor in and of itself is a fascinating
thing because I, I have [00:30:00] built enough of an audience on TripAdvisor
that hotels know when I’m coming, and look forwardTracy Coenen: Stop it.
Eric Brotman: to me being there, thankfully. No, I’m serious. TripAdvisor. I
don’t, I don’t blog whatsoever. But I’ve had hotels say, “we’re so glad you’re
here. Here’s my card. If you, if you would say something nice about us, that’d be
great. And here’s a room upgrade, or here’s some adult beverages and snacks in
your room”. Just from TripAdvisor.
Tracy Coenen: So you are living my dream by accident, basically.
Eric Brotman: I, I, I wouldn’t say I’m living your dream. I would say that I’ve
experienced a, a small taste of what you’re thinking about, and I think it’s an
awesome, awesome thing to do when you grow up. I might even join you, I
mean, not literally, that’s weird for both of our spouses, but I might also be a
travel blogger and we could have competing blogs. You never know.
Tracy Coenen: Ooh, I love healthy competition.
Eric Brotman: I like a blog off. We should definitely consider that.
Tracy Coenen: Nice.
Eric Brotman: All right, last question. We need an extra credit assignment. We
need the one takeaway folks can use from having spent what I have enjoyed this
half hour with you. What, what, what can [00:31:00] folks do? What is the, the
one step that people listening or watching should take today as an extra credit
assignment? Not homework.
Tracy Coenen: Permission to give two extra credit assignments, sir?
Eric Brotman: Wow. You’re really, you’re really overdoing it. But, all right. If
they’re good–
Tracy Coenen: They’re really good.
Eric Brotman: If they’re really good. Because I don’t wanna overwhelm….
cause next week we’re gonna have another assignment, so, all right, go ahead.
Let’s see.
Tracy Coenen: There’s two of ’em.
Eric Brotman: So, but it, but it’s a pick one, right? This is a, this is a pick, pick
your favorite. It doesn’t have to be all of the above?
Tracy Coenen: No, it’s all of the above. Well, yeah, yeah. Pick your favorite.
Pick your favorite. Okay. So,
Eric Brotman: All right, let’s, let’s do it.
Tracy Coenen: If, if what I talked about today regarding financial infidelity
resonated with you, if you have some concerns, if there’s that pit in your
stomach, go to fraudcoach.com. Take that red flag assessment that’s linked at
the top of the page and just see where you stand. You know, it can help ease
your concerns, or it can help let you know you really do need to take some
action steps and, and I’ll give you some action steps in the results that you get
from that.
So that’s your first extra credit. [00:32:00] Your sec- second extra credit is to go
buy my book at the end of April when it comes out. It’s called Find Me the
Money, and it is all about winning the money that you deserve in your divorce.
Eric Brotman: Well, I appreciate the two extra credit assignments. You stole
my thunder. I was gonna tee up the book at the end here, but you’ve already
done it, so Find Me the Money. I love it. I will absolutely want a copy. I will
want a signed copy, of course. And, and I will be glad to review it online if if, if
so. So folks can check you out fraudcoach.com. They can find me the money,
the new book coming out at the end of April, so very, very soon. This has been
a ton of fun.
Thank you so much for sharing not only your wisdom, but your, your humor
with our audience. I, I’ve thoroughly enjoyed it.
Tracy Coenen: I appreciate you letting me invite myself onto your podcast. It
was great fun. Can I leave you with a fun story?
Eric Brotman: Absolutely.
Tracy Coenen: So Find Me the Money [00:33:00] is- you figured out in our
conversation before we went live- is a little bit of a play on “show me the
money” from Jerry McGuire. And I’ve been working really hard on this book,
you know, of course we’re preparing for it to come out. We recently finalized
that cover that you saw. And a couple of weeks ago I was in an airport standing
in the security line, and three people behind me was Cuba Gooding Jr.
Eric Brotman: No kidding!
Tracy Coenen: And… no kidding. I mean the timing is just unreal. Now here’s
the deal. He was with someone who I assume was a business manager or
something like that, and they were beside themselves because they were in
danger of missing their flight. And so I had the good sense to look at them,
smile calmly and look away and not ask him to shoot a video with me saying,
show me the money.
Eric Brotman: Yeah. Well, hopefully he hears this show. I’m sure he is a big
fan and will remember you from that- which airport was it?
Tracy Coenen: I was in Miami.
Eric Brotman: Cuba Gooding Jr. If [00:34:00] you’re out there- please, you
owe Tracy a solid. We’ll go with it that way. Thank you for being here.
Tracy Coenen: And he’s, he’s one of your biggest fans. Thank you for having
me. It was so much fun.
Eric Brotman: I’d like to thank all of you for listening and watching today.
This has been a ton of fun. We’d love to hear from you, so please send us a
message or leave us comments at dontretiregraduate.com or on social media. If
you enjoy our show, don’t keep it a secret. Share it with your friends and family
so they can join you on your journey to financial freedom.
And please leave ratings and reviews on your favorite podcast platforms, they
are priceless to us. We’ll be back next week with another installment of Office
Hours, and in two weeks with another engaging guest, likely with only one
extra credit assignment. For now, this is your host, Eric Brotman, reminding
you don’t retire, graduate.
Securities offered through Kestra Investment Services, LLC. Kestra IS: member
FINRA, [00:35:00] SIPC. Investment Advisory Services offered through Kestra
Advisory Services, LLC. Kestra AS, an affiliate of Kestra IS. Kestra IS, or
Kestra AS are not affiliated with Brotman Financial or any other entity
discussed.