Our guest today, Tiffany “The Budgetnista” Aliche, is quickly becoming America’s favorite personal financial educator. She is also a best-selling author and founder of the Live Richer Challenge.

During the height of the recession in 2009 Tiffany lost her job when the school where she had worked as a preschool teacher for ten years was cut from the budget. For the next two years she stayed with relatives and collected unemployment while trying to figure out what to do next.

She loved educating, and she loved personal finance. She eventually started matching those two passions together and doing it on a volunteer basis at first.

In this episode Tiffany talks to us about:

How she went from making $25,000 three years ago to running an almost million-dollar business today. How she didn’t conquer her fear but learned to listen to the other voice that said “do it anyway.” If you’re waiting for the fear to subside first, you’re going to be waiting forever. How she started a business by only putting money into it that would generate money back. She couldn’t afford a website so she had a free blog, she couldn’t afford business cards so she made photocopies. For media coverage she used a website called HARO. She would give simple quotes to reporters and in exchange she was able to use their logo on her website. Logo begets logo. When another reporter sees that it makes them more likely to want to talk to you. Live Richer Challenge. This is something free that they offer every year. It is a month’s worth of free step by step guidance. Sign up on the website and for one month get one easy financial task in your email that will lead you toward a better financial life. People have bought homes, collectively saved 20 million dollars in two years, paid off a million dollars of debt, raised credit scores and more. Tiffany is the best-selling author of The One Week Budget and The Live Richer Challenge.

To build a strong following on social media you have to be a giver. Everyone is always saying buy my book, eat my food, or whatever. Nobody cares, everyone cares about themselves. If you’re talking about you no one cares but you (and maybe your mom). Instead it is your job to give. Tiffany just, for the first time in six years, asked her audience to pay for something.

Tiffany said if there is anything she would go back and invest in it would be online training, like a blogging course. She also wishes she had invested in an assistant since she literally did everything herself.

You’re going to mess up but you want to fail fast, succeed faster.

You can reach Tiffany at:

Website: thebudgetnista.com All social media platforms: budgetnista