Happy Mother's Day to all the human moms and pet moms!

I don't have human kids, but I have two beautiful dogs that I love very much (some pictures below). 

Can you also believe it's been three years since I quit my corporate job at Visa? You can read more about the first month after becoming a full-time entrepreneur in this blog. I started my business at the end of 2016, so it's almost six years since I became a financial coach. 

It's been quite a ride and blessings since, from quitting my job to moving here to a new city in Las Vegas where I didn't know anyone to buying a brand new house to business growth on both the tax and coaching front. It's been a great ride. I am truly blessed. 

I am offering a 15% discount on everything in honor of all the wonderful moms and my Anniversary. Use discount code MomsAreAwesome for the online courses. The sale ends next Sunday, May 15th.

I currently have two courses available. 
The Budgeting course - teaches you the method I use for my budgeting and all my private coaching clients. All you need is Excel or Google Sheet. This course is at the regular price of $59.
LinkedIn course - even though I haven't been on LinkedIn for a while, the philosophy to grow is still the same. So I am selling it now for only $97. Discount is also applicable to this.

And I am super excited to announce that I am currently working on the Financial Literacy course. So I am shooting to have that released in the next week or two. This course comes with a complimentary half an hour of coaching as well.
You can see the full agenda of the course on this site. You can now do a pre-order to take advantage of the discount. 
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I am also honoring the 15% discount on any of my coaching packages, just as long as you set up the complimentary chat for anytime this month and mention this discount*.

*Discount is not applicable on installment plans.

This year has flown by quick. We are already finishing half of the year. As I adjust and settle into my new life here in Vegas, I haven't been as active on social media but I do post whenever I can on Instagram, Facebook or LinkedIn.  Please follow me to get updates when I post. 😊

As I adjust, I realize that I do like the city. I love the Strip. I don't gamble nor drink (more a social drinker) but I do enjoy the shows, entertainment and the "city" life the Strip offers. At the same time, I appreciate the quietness and the other activities Vegas offers outside of the strip. So I get the best of both worlds and I love that. Plus, most people or friends I know will eventually visit the Strip sooner or later. I mean who doesn't want to see the gigantic casinos that the Strip offers at least once in their life, right? So I will see my friends or acquaintances when they visit.

With this decision to stay, I have decided early this year to go ahead and purchase a home. I went around with my realtor to look at resale homes but the market has been very competitive that several of my offers were not accepted. I had one that was accepted but the inspection report came back with major issues that could potentially cost me a lot of money.

After the frustration from this experience, I decided to just go with a brand new home. I have always wanted a brand new home but I was targeting a certain budget. After the disappointing experience above, I decided to increase my budget so I can go for a house that I want - with the specs I want, a big enough size with enough rooms for my hobbies and passions. The house is 1966 square feet with a 3 bedroom, 2.5 bath, and a loft that I am converting into a dance room, plus a backyard mainly for my dogs (super important for me and I'm sure for them too! 😄)

I have owned a condo before (read about my experience regarding that) and jointly owned a condo-style townhouse with no backyard in the Bay Area with a former partner. This would be my first time to ever own a single-family house with a backyard under just my own name so it is a proud accomplishment for me. I have always wanted to live in a lower cost of living area so I don't have to work as hard and continue my semi-retired lifestyle. I also put down a large enough downpayment so my monthly housing cost will be very low. After I settle in, my housing expenses will actually be lower than my current rental (I am living in a one-bedroom apartment at the moment for only $1250 - this would have been closer to $3000 had I stayed in the Silicon Valley area). You can start counting the reasons why I've moved here right? 😉

The equivalent house I bought would also have been four times the price in the Bay Area. For reference I bought my home for around $400K and two almost equivalent houses currently on market as of today in Milpitas where I was from is being offered for almost $1.6M (house 1, house 2). I could essentially afford it since I have been down that road before owning a home in the Silicon Valley area so I know how to work around my budget for that but I want to take it easy and enjoy not working as hard anymore. Hence, here I am. Everything I did was intentional to get to a place where I am semi-retired with a schedule I can always change to fit my needs and still continue doing what I love - helping people with their finances plus enjoy my hobbies and what the city has to offer.

How are your financial goals going? Do you feel confident about where you are headed? If you need help or just want to chat, feel free to set up a complimentary chat. I also have a Fourth of July sale going on right now for all my services. If you set up a complimentary and officially sign up as my client from now till midnight PST on July 4th, you will get 20% off any services or packages you pay upfront (discount does not apply to installment plans).

As if the ending of a long-term relationship wasn't hard enough, I decided I wanted to start over somewhere else so I decided to move to Las Vegas. Check out my article where I talked about this.

There must be something about the number 20 that makes me move. I immigrated to the Bay Area from the Philippines back in 2000 and then moved to Vegas 20 years later. Check out my article sharing my immigrant story.
I didn't know anyone when I moved here to Vegas back in August.

I had no family nor friends at that time living here.

Was I scared to move and start all over again?

Of course! It’s normal to feel at least some nervousness moving to a new city and starting all over. Thankfully, I already have an established business which allows me to work pretty much anywhere in the world remotely, so I didn't have to worry about the financial piece.

One of my worries of having to start all over again was spending the holidays on my own. I like to be around people during the holidays. Since I moved during the pandemic it was challenging at first to meet new people and make friends due to the restrictions — in-person meet-ups and events were very limited.

Thankfully Vegas is more relaxed and dine-in was already allowed when I moved here. Not to mention there are lots of apps where you can meet friends. I became very proactive joining several Facebook groups and used Bumble bff (if you didn't know there is a bff version of this dating app). I have met some great people through these two channels.

I am thankful that almost three months in, I already have a number of friends I can just call and hang out with now. I’ve even been invited to two homes for Thanksgiving.

I definitely have a lot to be thankful for in life.

So why am I bringing this up? I am sharing this mainly because I meet people who are scared of moving to a new place where they don't know anyone and then they complain about not having friends. Then they complain about being lonely and then they go out in the dating world only to be burned by the wrong men.

I've also heard from others about people moving here and complaining about the heat, the traffic, etc. I personally don't attract complainer friends into my life so I only hear it through others. If I do, they normally stop complaining when being around me or they disappear pretty quickly from my life. Want to know how? Study the "Law of Attraction".

The other reason I'm also sharing this is to remind you that you get back what you put in the world. This same concept applies to your finances. Friends don't just show up at your door, you have to be proactive and put yourself out there. Your finances aren't going to improve if you just sit back and do nothing thinking whatever you're doing is going to change anything. 

Since it is Thanksgiving and Black Friday this week, I want to make it easier for you to get your finances together and to stop making excuses. 

I'm offering 50% off* my financial coaching services till the end of November.

To take advantage of the financial coaching discount, you just have to schedule a complimentary chat till end of November and pay the full fee during the complimentary.

*In order to qualify for 50% off, you must have an adjusted gross income of $70K or less ($140K or less for couples combined). You will be asked to show your 2019 1040 form so I can verify during our call. All others will receive 25% off.

Hope everyone enjoys their Thanksgiving. 

Top 3 Reasons People Stay broke

Step 1 👉🏻 Visualize being rich
Step 2 👉🏻 Do nothing
Step 3 👉🏻 Repeat steps 1 and 2

The above is meant to be humorous but I have encountered people who think just visualizing and doing positive affirmations and believing that they'll be rich is going to get them rich.

Sorry to share the news, but NO that won't get you anywhere if you don't take any action. Visualization and positive affirmations are there to provide you a tool so you can take inspired actions that can propel you towards the goals you visualize about. 

Also hiring a coach won't get you anywhere if you don't do the work. We can only lead the horse to water but we can't make them drink.


Christine Teh is a personal finance coach who lives in Silicon Valley and serve clients virtually. She also offers tax preparation and consulting services and LinkedIn coaching as well.

Schedule a complimentary chat now to see if her financial coaching services are right for you!
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What about money are you grateful for?

Remember you attract more of what you’re grateful for.

So let me start by sharing my top 5 reasons I’m grateful about money.

• Money allowed me to buy a home I love and not worry about rising rents

, especially in Silicon Valley, where rents are always increasing.

• Money allowed me to live a lifestyle that I love.
• Money allowed me to pay for insurance for myself and for my fur babies. Remember, you don’t want to not have insurance. Life happens and just think about how much it would cost you if you got coronavirus and you have to stay in the hospital for a while.
• Money allows me to send money to my family in the Philippines. My family may be considered poor by some people so I am grateful that when my mom needs money, I can gladly send it to her.
• Money allowed me to save enough in my emergency fund so I don’t have to panic during the next few months while the vaccination for Covid-19 is still being worked on.

So now it’s your turn, what are you grateful for money? What has money done for you? 
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Christine Teh is a personal finance coach who lives in Silicon Valley and serve clients virtually. She also offers tax preparation and consulting services and LinkedIn coaching as well.

Schedule a complimentary chat now to see if her financial coaching services are right for you!
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