Mastering Your Credit Before It Masters You (Episode 21)

🎧 Want to unlock a secret financial advantage most teens never hear about? Credit repair expert Tamiya Robles reveals game-changing strategies for building stellar credit while you're still in high school - setting you up for major financial wins after graduation.

Think credit scores are just for adults? Think again! In this eye-opening episode, Tamiya breaks down exactly how teens can start building wealth-generating credit profiles before they even get their diploma. She shares insider knowledge that most people don't discover until it's too late.

Learn powerful insights about:

• How to start building credit before you turn 18 (legally and safely!)
• Smart moves that can give you a high credit score right out of high school
• Common credit mistakes teens should avoid
• How good credit can save you thousands on future car loans and housing
• Steps to take now that will make college financing easier
• Building generational wealth starting in your teen years

Perfect for: Forward-thinking teens, young investors, future entrepreneurs, and anyone wanting to get a head start on their financial future.

Features practical, actionable advice that can transform your financial future, explained in teen-friendly terms by a top industry expert.

Tamiya's website:

https://fixmycreditnow850.com/

To listen to her podcast:

https://coast2coastcredit.buzzsprout.com/

Transcript

Welcome to Mindshift Power podcast, a show for teenagers and the adults who work with them, where we have raw and honest conversations. I'm your host, Fatima Bey, the mind shifter. And welcome, everyone. Today, we have with us Tamaya Robles, and she's located in California. She is also a fellow podcaster, and she owns fixmycreditnow850.com.

She is super passionate about helping people to elevate themselves. And her way of helping people to elevate themselves is to help you through your credit. So how are you doing today, Tamaya? I'm doing pretty good. And yourself?

I'm good. I'm I'm looking forward to this conversation. So tell us, what is what is Fix My Credit Now eight fifty? What do you do? Well, thanks for asking.

I am a credit repair expert. FixMyCreditNow850.com is actually my credit repair company. So what I do is I teach credit repair. I fix people's credit naturally. And I also assist with other things related to, credit and credit repair, such as, helping people get business credit, sometimes creating a business so they can obtain business credit.

I go into trade lines. I help people with student loans, getting them discharged, forgiven, things like that. And and I'm trying to actually encourage people not to get rid of their their student loans, but to actually, make it positive into a positive trade line. But, yeah, I do a lot. I do a lot.

Okay. Well, I know you do. Now, because this this we're talking to teenagers today. And because the show is geared towards, you know, teenagers, let's start off with the basics. What exactly is credit?

Okay. So credit is basically when you're you have a contract to borrow money from an entity. In particular, we could say a bank, and you're agreeing to a set amount with an interest rate, and you have to pay overtime the balance in a nutshell. Like, that's the easiest way to explain it. It's the same when you're trying to purchase when you purchase a car, when you purchase a home, when you have credit cards.

The credit cards come from a bank. The money the funds come from a bank. So you're in agreement to borrow this money under certain terms and conditions where how much money you get determines on your credit score, and that's where I come in. So and that's where this podcast kinda leads to. Right?

So when you have a high credit score, you get a higher limit. You get better a better contract. Let's say it let's put it that way. If you have poor credit, then you may get approved for a line of credit, but just under very poor circumstances. Okay.

So you said that and thank you for that explanation, by the way. I think that, we're so used to talking about credit in the adult world. We forget that the basics, like, what is it in the first place, gets kinda lost in the mush, I think. So you you work on credit repair. That's that's your focus.

Let's talk about how we can avoid the things we need to repair. So we're talking to teenagers. Right? So before they get into needing to to repair their credit and being the adult that has to come to you because now we done messed it all up. Right?

What are common mistakes that I think most pea I would say most people make right out of high school? Can you tell us a few? I can definitely say that. So first off, not educating yourself on what credit is and how it works before you become an adult. That in itself should be something that you study like you do any other subject in high school.

You would wanna add this to your your your your profile, I guess, to educate yourself on what credit is. Because once you educate yourself in, you can try to avoid mistakes to the best of your ability. So that's first off, understanding what credit is and getting educated. And then the next step is educating yourself on how to fix any mistakes you may have. Right?

So let's start off with that. Aside let's say you didn't know what credit was or or you weren't gonna educate yourself, but you did you did wanna be careful. Just start practicing paying for things on time. So even as a teenager, you might have an allowance and you have to pay maybe something maybe on regularly. Maybe you have to pay a membership fee.

Practice paying on time. Practice looking at your statements. Maybe you're paying an Internet bill. Maybe you have to pay your cell phone bill. You just take a look at your bill and learn everything that's on there.

Read the fine print. And it may seem, like, unimportant right now. Like, I get it. Okay. This is how much I have to pay.

This is when it's due. But I don't know if you, well, I'm talking to the kids, but I don't know if you've, are familiar with the term, the details and the devil. I mean, the devil's in the detail. Right? So the devil being in a detail is where there might be some special wording in a disclaimer or this fine print or on the tenth page of a bill statement.

We're used to seeing what's on the front page. It's colorful. It's easy to read, but then part of your contract might have changed, and they're not gonna say anything except in small wording on the back end, on the last page. Learn how to read what you're signing over to, what you're agreeing to. That will in a nutshell, that will avoid a lot of mistakes.

If you don't know anything else, do that. If you, you know, read the fine print. And but for the most part, it's just education. It's just learning something. Trial and error, but, you know, just practice on something small.

Like, for example, credit cards. A lot of people run away from credit cards or they're scared of credit cards. But as a teenager, you can get a secured credit card. You can get a gift card and practice with that. You know, where if you so called mess up, it's not really much you're messing up on.

It's not going to be detrimental to your future. Real quick. What's a secured credit card? Secured credit card. So so, secured credit card is different than an unsecured credit card.

So let me explain both, actually. So when you go to a bank and you're asking for a line of credit or it goes back to the definition of credit where you're asking to borrow money and sign a contract where you will repay that with interest, you get a credit card. So there's two versions of the credit card. You have a unsecured credit card is that's what you actually want to always have. And then you have a secured credit card.

So the unsecured credit card is where the bank blindly trusts you with a higher amount of credit, and it can vary. It could be 5,000, 10 thousand dollars, 20 thousand dollars. The higher your credit score, the better your credit profile, the bigger the loan is gonna be. But the unsecured the secured credit card is for those that they can't trust at all, not with their money and, honestly, not with your money. So if you go to apply for unsecured credit card and they look at your credit report and they'd see either no credit, like most teenagers have.

Right? And there's actually a solution behind that, and we'll talk about that soon. But if you have zero credit or if you have super bad credit, then they'll say, you know what? We're not going to approve you for an unsecured credit card, but what you can do is you can give us some money, just a couple of hundred dollars, maybe $2,300, and we'll put it in a form of a credit card. Right?

And but it's your own money. And we're gonna watch you over time and see if you pay yourself back on time, if you pay yourself interest. And if you're doing this regularly, okay, then we'll say after a certain amount of time, give us a couple more hundred dollars. But they're gonna keep doing this until the bank feels comfortable that you're responsible enough to be given an unsecured credit card. So that is the difference between, unsecured.

But a lot of people, if you're I would recommend as a teenager, you're not about to buy a house in in most cases. You're not about to purchase a home anytime soon. You're not about to purchase get a car loan anytime soon in most cases. I'm not talking about all cases, in most cases. So it would be best to take the time to get a secured credit card, and that'll help your credit in the long run.

Yes. And how old do you have to be to get a secured credit card? To be to that actually depends on the bank. It depends on the bank. It depends on Okay.

What state you're in a lot of times because what not every state considers 18 to be an adult. They might consider 17, six so it varies. But, I think you can be I'm pretty sure you can be a minor with an unsecured credit card. If you cannot, then, as long as you have a a guardian or if you're considered, what is it? I forgot the name when you are independent from your parents.

As long as you can prove that you're independent from your parents, then you should be able to get a credit card as a minor. Yeah. Okay. Why does credit matter? Okay.

Credit matters. Why does credit matter? So it depends on what type of credit that you're referring to. So there's personal credit and business credit, which we will also get into. But the ultimate goal is you wanna use other people's money.

You don't wanna use your own money. And it sounds messy to say that. What that means is you wanna obtain things and not really spend your own money. You want to live off of credit to the best of your ability. You don't so let's say you do wanna purchase a car, and let's say your car was $10,000.

You could either pay $10,000 in cash and own it flat out and not have good credit with that. There's no trace. And when you pay for things in cash, there's no trace of any sort of credit. And if you're responsible or not, it's untraceable. We don't even know where you got it from if you're paying for something in cash.

But if you pay with credit, what's gonna happen is you're going to the bank, you're getting approved for a line of credit, and it's their money. It's literally not yours that you paid out of pocket for. What you are paying out of pocket for and you don't even have to really do that, but that's getting into, credit on a whole different level. But what what you are paying out of pocket is gradually over time, you're paying, a payment. You're pay you have an agreement with them, and it's a monthly payment with some interest tied into that.

You're not paying the full 10,000. That would what is better? To pay for everything in cash if you don't really have it like that? Even if you're you're you're you're moderate to you're moderate income or you're mid level income or I don't wanna say low income because if you're low income, then you should definitely be careful of what you should and shouldn't be purchasing. But even if you have the money to pay for things in cash, you wanna build credit because that means the banks will want to give you more than what you have as well.

So that also is helpful on the business side and the personal side. So what do I mean by that? I don't know if you're familiar. There was recently an article, that came out that Jay z and Beyonce bought a house, and it cost, I don't know, let's say, $50,000,000. Of course, they have $50,000,000.

But, yeah, they they the article was kinda trying to low key slander them because they bought the house with credit. And they were like, yeah. They're billionaires buying a house that cost millions, and they could just write a check for it. But why? Why?

I don't wanna use my money. I wanna use your money. And then I wanna pay on it over time so I have more money in my pocket, and I'm building equity, right, when it when it talks about when you talk about purchasing a home. Okay. Next question.

What is equity, T'Miyah? I'll tell you. So you have some things that and and and and this is important for the kids because there's certain things that you want to purchase and certain things you don't wanna purchase. Right? Honestly, you don't really wanna purchase a car because a car depreciates in value, which means if you buy it, it loses its value the moment you drive off the lot with it.

If you purchase a home, over time, it builds, it grows, it gives you interest, it gives you, equity. I'm sorry. So it is making you money. So you wanna look for items that will make you money and that you can purchase with credit. I'll give you an example.

People like what do you call those? I I really wish I was more into fashion, but I'm not. But there's those very expensive name brand bags with the t on it, for example, or those Birkin bags. They're gonna appreciate in value. You get once a day for $1,500, and ten years from now, it'll probably be worth $5,000.

If I can purchase that bag off of credit, I have it. I have it. It's mine. It's in my house. Right?

I have that Birkin. Right? I have that bag with the t on it. But I'm only paying, like, maybe $50 a month. And over time, it's getting it's it's making me money.

Right? And as it's as I'm getting, as it it's accruing in value and I'm getting equity in that product, I can actually pull the equity out. I can go to the bank and say, hey. This item I've been paying for, with your money, by the way, I see that it's building equity. I wanna take that equity out, and I wanna borrow it.

And then they'll say, sure. But you have to be in good standing. You have to just pay things on time. Pay things on time. Use the bank's money.

Don't use your own money. And if you're really So building really credit set. Mhmm. What I'm hearing is that building your credit helps to build your your future in more ways than one. Yes.

Yes. Yes. Yes. In so many ways. Yes.

You don't really the to be honest with you, you can you can have multiple credit cards and have the credit cards pay themselves and get a profit and take the profit out of that and just keep putting it back in the credit cards. I mean, there's so many things you could do with credit. You can cash credit out. You can have it repay itself. It's pretty flexible.

What I'm hearing is at the base of a lot of what you're saying is discipline. If we wanna build credit Discipline? Mhmm. If we wanna build anything else, honestly, not just credit, we need discipline. And Mhmm.

If we can find ways easy. Like yes. Yes. And if we could find ways to practice some discipline when it comes to our finances, we can easily build credit. But anytime we don't practice discipline in any part of life, it will fall apart, not just credit.

Right now, we're talking about credit. But Mhmm. I I think that that's a key thing to point out is that, hey. You gotta build. And I like the idea of, using other people's money.

Woo hoo. And if you build credit, you will you'll be able to do that because they'll look at you and say, okay. You're responsible. Here's more money, you know, insured. Let me ask you another question.

Is credit repair that's just a thing for Canada and The US. Right? No. So credit repair is be credit itself and how we use it into The United States is being copied throughout the world. In certain countries, it's starting to adopt our credit system.

So far, Canada is a close second. Right? So it's a close, close second. So credit repair in United States and Canada are very similar to each other, but we have different our our dollar, is different. The American dollar is different than the Canadian dollar and things like that.

So there is a slight difference. So but I can't fix credit in Canada, but they just mimic our similar credit system. And then other countries are slowly but surely adopting this practice. So, and it's imitating us. So and then one thing that a lot of people don't understand, believe it or not, India also somewhat has their hand in how The United States, handles credit.

So, you know, India, Canada, and certain countries in Africa are copying our style. So yeah. So it's it's a bigger issue than just buying a car. That that's kinda my point is for people to understand that, it's it's bigger than just you know, sometimes we tend to think of it as a small thing we have to deal with, but bigger picture, and it sounds like it's growing. It's a big picture for sure.

Mhmm. I'm sorry. Now for teens, what can you what can you tell a teenager listening right now what they should you just told them what they should try to do. But what should they try to avoid right now? Not being educated.

Not being educated on credit and where it's going because in my opinion, it's it's going to be personal credit's gonna be obsolete, but you will need to have good credit in order to get business credit. Personal credit is gonna be absolute, but business credit is going to thrive. So Okay. What I would tell a teenager just starting off before before they start off, I would catch them. I'd say, honestly, freshman year freshman year of high school.

Start edging your educating yourself on what credit is. Because it's forever changing, like technology, and because of technology in a lot of cases, you wanna refresh yourself every year. And then you wanna start building, and having a line of credit as early as possible, and that's where your parents come in. Because you're a minor, you can't get unsecured credit by yourself unless you prove that you are, emancipated. That's what I meant to say.

Yeah. Emancipated minor, I do believe they call it. Is that emancipated? Okay. Yeah.

That's true. So unless you can prove that, and even still, I think you have to be a certain age, but you want to reach out to your parents and have the talk with them because some of our parents don't understand or know credit either. So I would recommend kinda making it a family thing as far as educating yourself. To this day, for example, my father, he was very good with money, and he made a ton of money for the family. I wanted for nothing, but he has no clue when it comes to credit.

All he knows is pay the bill on time, and that's what he did all his life. And he knew he had high credit, but he didn't know anything beyond that, and he didn't care because he knew he paid all his bills on time. So now that I'm a credit expert and I'm telling him about things, he's totally lost. And he's like, I'm learning because you're teaching me. So as a teenager, you wanna have the talk with your parents like they have the talk with you.

Right? And say, hey. Before I go into this world, I would like to build a credit profile. I wanna understand credit, and I want you to understand credit with me. And one of the best things I could do for myself is to add myself as an authorized user on your credit cards.

Because the moment you add your child with the with their Social Security number onto a a good standing credit card, a credit card with no missed payments, no latenesses, anything like that, it gets mimic on their child's credit report. So they go from having no credit at all to having amazing credit. You wanna start your life off before you go to college, before you start, seeking credit yourself. You want us if you could start off at a 800 credit score, that would be absolutely amazing. So that means anytime you're applying for anything, you got it.

No questions asked. Unsecured what? You know what I'm saying? So you wanna have that talk. You wanna have that education with them, and then, that you already know what to avoid.

The main thing is you wanna avoid not paying for things on time. And then you wanna start purchasing things that you can afford and afford to pay back, whether it's even if it's your getting your phone, your phone number in your name. That's a line of credit. That's something that they report to the credit bureau. Why don't you start telling your parents, hey.

Thank you for this allowance, or I work at McDonald's part time. I wanna start paying you rent. Right? Mom and dad, $20 a month. Tell mom and dad that they can report the rent payments to the credit bureaus is very easy.

So you're building positive credit before they even hit the world. That is an excellent idea. What I love the idea. That's an excellent idea. That's really good advice.

Pay $20 a month, which is nothing, and just, you know, build your credit because it's consistent it's a consistent number, consistent algorithm as you could say. Yeah. Now let let's talk about business credit because you you mentioned that earlier, and I think it's a a key point to bring up. I'm really, really big on on entrepreneur entrepreneurship, and I try to push our youth to become entrepreneurs as much as possible. So let's say I am a teenager in high school, junior year high school, and I know that I wanna have my own business.

What should I be doing right now to prepare myself? Mhmm. So what you wanna do to prepare is, again, always understand credit. Know the laws in your state because, every state, is completely different. I would try to keep everything as low as possible as far as your overhead is concerned.

So I will wanna create a business in one of the states that are one anonymous states because one of my businesses, actually anonymous, but it's also the fees are very low. And those are usually five states such as Delaware, which is a huge state to start a business in, Kentucky, I forgot the the New Mexico, I do believe. Oh, I didn't know that. You're gonna be deemed foreign and but you have the option to be anonymous, and you have and you don't and your and your, taxes are super low, like, dirt cheap low. And I'm saying that starting off because this is your new business.

You don't know where it's gonna go. You don't know if that might fail. You have to start another business and have another business absorb. You don't you don't know what you're gonna go with it, so you wanna keep your overhead as low as possible. Okay?

So I would I would start off doing that, and then I would try to transfer as much as you can over to your business even as a teenager. So remember when you paid your parents the $20 for rent. Now that you have your business established, and make sure you have you you crossed your t's and dotted your i's with that because, again, every state is different. I would ask mom and dad, hey. Can you, like, write a letter to show that this is what I was doing, report it to the bureau, but then have your company take over that?

So instead of it showing Susan Smith was paying mom and dad, Susan Smith might have a company called ABC Productions. So ABC Productions is now paying mom and dad the $20. So that's how you're building your business credit. And if remember when I said, hey. You know?

Get the get your phone in your name. So once your business is established, you wanna do this after the fact, then you wanna have ABC Productions take over that phone bill. What that does is now you're building before you're asking anyone for money, it's looking like you already have money. It looks like you already have established your own credit by yourself through your business. So now your business is strong just like your personal credit was strong because mom and dad put you on as an authorized user.

Mom and dad was letting everybody let the letting the credit bureaus know you were paying rent. Right? You got your own phone bill in your own name. You may or may have a well, you probably have a job, or we can prove that you have a job. Right?

You're already your personal credit is already straight. You're in eight hundreds. Now your business has absorbed your debt because that's debt. Right? Paying someone rent, that's debt.

Paying on a phone bill, that's debt. So your business took over the debt, and now your business is in a position to go to the banks with a straight face and say, I want a hundred and $50,000 for my new business. So that's what you wanna do. That's what you wanna do. Awesome.

That's the excellent idea. Entrepreneur. Mhmm. Yeah. That's excellent.

And it's not hard. No. It's really not hard. You don't need attorneys involved. I mean, it's it's it's really not hard.

You can get attorneys if you if you want, especially if you choose to be anonymous. Like I did, I got an attorney. But I've opened five businesses in a matter of ten minutes, so it's it's not that hard. Well, that's awesome. That's awesome.

I like that advice about building your credit, your personal credit, and then turning that into your business credit, once you're established. And and finding there it just goes to show you that where there's a will, there's a way. We can always find a way to make things work for us, and make things better for us. And then you're starting off on good footing, you know, right after high school. I'm a firm believer that you can come out of high school and go right into entrepreneurship, but I just think that you have to be properly prepared for it.

And I think this is one of those one of those elements of being properly prepared for it so that you have a better future. And then when you go back to your reunion, everybody else is, you know, doing whatever they're doing, but you can say I'm successful, and I'm I'm making 6 figures now or whatever it is, whatever your version of success is. I just think that's wonderful. So, Tamaya, how can people find you? Well, you can find me on the Internet.

I'm all over social media. So you can go to my, the my website, which is the name of my company, fixmycreditnow850.com. If you are on Facebook, I actually have five Facebook groups, but the main one that I'm on, I'm most active in, is called Credit and First Time Home Buyers Plug. Many, I do a lot of credit education there, even first time home buyers. There's real estate agents, lenders, and even bankers.

If you have any questions, definitely hop on there, and someone will help you. And we all love education, so definitely hop on and check me out there. I'm also on YouTube. My YouTube is, you should be able to find me under fix my credit now at 850.com. And in the airways, I have a podcast called Coast to Coast Credit, and you can find me on Coast to Coast Credit as well.

Well, Tamaya, thank you very much for coming on today. We really, really I really appreciate it, and you taking the time to educate our our next generation. And, hopefully, they can do better than we did because they listened to you. Yeah. Thanks for having me.

I love it. I love educating, especially the young ones. I think in 2024, I'm considering having a some a credit summer school where it's not gonna be the whole summer, but just credit education for a week. So be on the lookout for that. But, I I've been a couple parents have reached out to me over the years and asked.

Oh, okay. But, I think I'm definitely gonna strive for it on 2024. That sounds awesome. Well, thank you again. You're welcome.

Thank you for having me. And now for a mind shifting moment. In today's episode, we talked about finances. Well, at least in the arena of finances. You're gonna hear throughout this podcast financing from different perspectives.

And today, the focus was focus was on credit with a lot of really wise advice. But I want you to take a deeper dive. Go back and listen to the episode again and think of things this way. Instead of just hearing the details of the advice that she gives, listen to the principles behind those details. Here's a little secret.

Most of the principles of life that work can be found in the principles behind finance. So go back and listen again, and listen for the principles and not just at the details. Because you'll find that in life, if you listen for principles instead of just details, you will learn all the secrets of life and gain all the wisdom you need to have. Listen to that again. Thank you for listening to Mindshift Power Podcast.

Please like and subscribe to my YouTube channel at the mind shifter. If you have any comments, topic suggestions, or would like to be a guest on the show, please visit FatimaBay.com/podcast. Remember, there's power in shifting your thinking. Tune in for next week.