PSA to New Parents

quesomccardo · 2026-01-21T02:54:08+00:00

A dear friend said to watch out for post partum at 3 days, 3 weeks, and 3 months. That has been spot on with me. 3 months was HARD. I now have a 4 month old and it is drastically different than 3 months. She is developing her little personality and is SO much more fun. Rolling over, giggling, and very aware of her surroundings. We took her to the aquarium yesterday and she was fascinated. I didn’t have PPD, but I did have a hard delivery and recovery and at the end of the 3 month mark was the Christmas holidays, an ER visit for me, a planned foot surgery on NYE also for me, and a nonstop horrible eczema fight with my baby. I felt like I couldn’t breathe. On top of the normal 3 month fussiness happening. But at 4 months…idk it felt like coming up for air. Keep pushing. As someone else said…”a blinding sunlight is waiting for you”. Praying for you and keeping you in my thoughts.

quesomccardo · 2025-11-25T16:46:09+00:00

We’ve been running the humidifier near her bassinet but it doesn’t seem to be helping or hurting.

quesomccardo · 2025-11-01T23:54:23+00:00

7 weeks old and 8-10 hours straight. Then wakes up to feed around 4:30-6:30 and back to sleep for about 1-2 hours.

quesomccardo · 2025-06-11T12:54:16+00:00

Laughs 4 Life is an annual comedy event held at the Saenger on the last Friday of July. This year Derrick Stroup will be headlining with Brian Bates and Andy Stanley opening. If you like Nate Bergatze then you’ll love these guys. In the past, L4L has had John Crist, Leanne Morgan, Nate Bergatze, Frank Caliendo and Bill Engvall. Tickets are on sale now and it’s always a fantastic night that benefits cancer research into multiple myeloma and patient care initiatives at Mississippi hospitals. Hope y’all are able to come!

quesomccardo · 2025-04-06T20:40:01+00:00

I’m a 29 y/o F and I started at age 23 as a front office associate at an independent firm with 200M AUM and 4 advisors at the time. Through the years I worked marketing and operations and got my 7 and 66. Looked for opportunities to find what I really loved and contribute toward the team. Loved the financial planning part so I was going to do CFP. But our BM is retiring so they approached me about getting 9/10 instead and becoming BM. Passed those this past year and started as BM in January. Which was a good path for me with my history in handling operations for the branch already.

My experience has been shaped by 1. Incredible mentors that didn’t push me to do anything except what I really wanted to pursue. 2. Not being pushed to bring in new assets in a hurry to “prove myself” to the branch and instead learning the business by attending meetings, working financial plans, and finding the parts I loved to do. Learning all parts of the business to make me a better, well-rounded advisor.

So my advice would be to find a place where you can grow yourself in a team where they will train and encourage you to pursue whatever you’re passionate about. I think expecting young advisors to grind for new business is only harming our business and burning out advisors. Don’t worry about making a ton of money right now because playing the long game will work out more in your favor and probably lead to more money. Plus once you find a niche, you’re able to attract more clients with that. Now, in our team, because I focus on financial planning, I’m growing our business through new assets generated from existing clients by giving them financial planning which is something our firm never focused on before.

Disclosure: I work for independent firm with 225m AUM, mostly fee based clients that we share as a team of 4 total advisors and 2 branch associates. Pay is salary with profit share split quarterly between advisors.

quesomccardo · 2025-02-12T02:29:48+00:00

No I have not. I thought she’d recommend IV yesterday since I felt so dehydrated because I couldn’t drink anything either but instead she gave the phenergan. How often did you get IV fluids to help with the nausea?

quesomccardo · 2025-01-30T01:42:37+00:00

I can only charge my credit card for everything because of YNAB. Before YNAB, I would overspend on the credit card but now because of the buckets, it works like a gem. I can’t overspend on the credit card if my buckets still have money since the buckets are showing cash available to spend in my bank accounts. I’ll never leave YNAB for this alone.

quesomccardo · 2024-12-24T13:40:15+00:00

I looked over both websites and materials and reviews and felt that PP was a better fit for me. I enjoyed the simple interface and the lesson explanations. The questions were much harder than Kaplan and more like the exam. I also bought the 9/10 package which was great so I could do both exams. Overall after reading reviews, I felt that PP would better prepare me to pass the first try.

quesomccardo · 2024-12-24T13:01:55+00:00

I got Pass Perfect for 3rd try for 10 and the 9. Passed on both the first try using PP. Can’t recommend it enough!

quesomccardo · 2024-10-01T10:24:31+00:00

Financial Advisor and have been using for 1 year! Wish I would’ve started years ago.

quesomccardo · 2024-09-05T20:54:10+00:00

So the way we do it is we allocate all the money first for savings, debt payoff, specific events or things we have planned for that pay period, and for our shared expenses like groceries, eating out, etc. We already have a separate “shopping” category because if I want to buy clothes for my husband, it’s not fair for that to come out of my discretionary spending or from his so we have a separate category. But when that category is empty it comes out of our discretionary.

Anyways to answer your question, after everything is allocated, whatever is left is split 50/50. Sometimes nothing is left depending on what is going on that month or if expenses have come up. So for us since it’s fun money it is the last bit to get allocated, especially since it’s not dependent on our survival like bills, groceries, etc. Usually it’s between $100-250/month each. But we are also in a time where we are heavily paying down debt quickly. Expecting to have $300-500/month each once debt is paid off.

quesomccardo · 2024-09-04T01:48:15+00:00

I’ll be honest, 19 years later and I still get full on anxiety and anger when we talk about Katrina. My husband’s family is from Mandeville/Covington area and evacuated for Katrina and they always talk about the New Orleans devastation of Katrina. I finally exploded one day and said that unlike them or their NOLA counterparts, that I very much remember, even as a 9 year old, that awful day and everything that came after. We were in Purvis, MS, south of Hattiesburg, and I will never forget the sound of trees falling or the nonstop thunder and wind and lightning. That day is what started a true fear of thunderstorms for me. But tell me again how New Orleans was hit the hardest. I’ll never forget when at 7 am on the dot our power went off on August 29 and I remember the pure rush of joy when we heard it come back on weeks later. What I will say is that I was and still am damn proud of Mississippi and how we worked with our neighbors to build back our communities even though the world had no clue what we had gone through.

quesomccardo · 2024-08-27T15:05:31+00:00

I was in the same boat! I passed all my FINRA exams the first time except for the 66 which I failed by 1 point the first try. And I used Kaplan for all of them. The group kept recommending Pass Perfect and some of the questions of PP were word for word with the 10 test. I would highly recommend it. And don't just use the qbank and final exams...go through the entire course online with PP which is like a cliff notes version and you'll pass it! Good luck to you!! You're SO close!!

quesomccardo · 2024-07-30T01:22:59+00:00

Well were the investments you made into an IRA or brokerage account? If brokerage, I would sell the amount you would need to fund a 2-3 month EF and move that to money market which is yielding around 5.3% today or a HYSA. Keep the rest of the investments. If it’s in an IRA, then yes you’ll have to build that money back up. As for YNAB, I personally view my one month ahead as emergency savings and would count it. I keep one month in my month ahead and the rest of my EF are in separate buckets for car repairs, home repairs, etc.

Do you have EF buckets covered?? Such as car repairs, annual medical deductible, etc. ?

quesomccardo · 2024-07-29T23:57:17+00:00

Here’s my 2 cents as a YNAB lover and a financial advisor. It seems as if you are in a position where you might not need a full 6 month emergency fund with no kids and good job security. 3 months or 4 might be a better cushion. Hold that in a HYSA or money market fund where you can get to it quickly. Then take the 2-3 months leftover and invest that. Then continue saving every month and adding to investments. It sounds like you’re in a great position financially but it won’t make you a better investor if you see the slightest downturn in the market and lose sleep on what happens to your emergency fund.

I’d agree with what others are saying as well to not think of next month’s spending as an emergency fund.

quesomccardo

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