EP # 180 - Brawley Adams on Navigating Financial Missteps and Building a Secure Future

Discover how to secure your financial future and avoid the costly mistakes of the past with insights from Brawley Adams of Omni Financial Services. Brawley, inspired by his grandparents' financial misfortunes during the dot-com bubble, shares his passion for guiding individuals and business owners toward their retirement dreams. Get a firsthand look at the importance of personalized financial advice and learn how to sift through the chaotic noise of online financial tips to find what truly works for you.

In an eye-opening conversation, Brawley reflects on his journey, including the humbling experience of being fired and what it taught him about perseverance and self-growth. His candid storytelling offers valuable lessons on the significance of trust in client-advisor relationships and busts common myths about financial planning. Tune in to gain practical knowledge and be inspired by Brawley's dedication to helping people achieve financial security.

OMNI Financial Services
Brawley Adams
239-939-4455
Estero, FL
brawley.adams@omnifinserv.com
WEBSITE

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, cabo, jim Schaller.

Speaker 2: 0:11

Welcome Good Neighbors to episode number 180 of the Good Neighbor Podcast estero. Today we have Good Neighbor Brawley Adams from Omni Financial Services. Welcome.

Speaker 3: 0:21

Thank you, Jim. Thanks for having me Excited to be here.

Speaker 2: 0:23

Absolutely Always good to get to know people here in the community and what they do, so let's jump right in and want you to share a little bit about what you do.

Speaker 3: 0:32

Yes, sir. So I'm with Omni Financial Services. I'm a financial advisor, so we help individuals and business owners plan for, execute and kind of realize their dreams in terms of providing an income into retirement, and so there's a lot of different ways that we do that through different insurances, different products, managing money. So it's really fun, it's really interesting. I have a lot of great conversations with individuals and business owners just on the things that we can do to improve their financial situation per se, I'm sure, I'm sure.

Speaker 2: 1:04

So let's back up your story a little bit. How did you get involved in the financial services industry?

Speaker 3: 1:09

Yep. So my grandparents retired around 2000 when everyone was investing in the dot-com companies and their financial advisor put all their money in a pretty risky investment, if I had to say so myself, and they lost a lot of their money because of it. And my grandfather is still working to this day. He's 86 years old, and so throughout college I've always kind of had an entrepreneurial spirit. Me and my wife traveled around the country a little bit right after college and then, when we settled down here in Southwest Florida, I started interviewing with different firms and trying to really figure out what I want to do for the rest of my life. And so once you find a good place to kind of settle and kind of hang your license, I guess, then you kind of go from there and just meet people, talk about financial myths or misconceptions or different things that you know they can learn in other places, and you just try to, you know, make a business out of that.

Speaker 2: 2:09

Absolutely Talking about those myths and misconceptions, is there something that maybe we could clear up for our listeners surrounding what you do?

Speaker 3: 2:16

Yeah, I think the big one is going to be I don't need a financial advisor, which has come over the past probably 10 to 15 years with the amount of information individuals can get from the internet and social media, is going to be a big one.

Speaker 3: 2:33

You see it every day with different experts trying to give you their little tips or tricks on what it means to be successful or to have a good investment and things like that. So I think it's really just trying to block out all that chaos and commotion that you can see or get from the internet Not saying that there isn't good advice there, but it's really trying to find and work with somebody that you trust and that has your best interest at heart is really going to be what's going to help you get to your goals at the end of the day. So I think that's really the biggest myth and misconception is you know, to your goals at the end of the day. So I think that's really the biggest myth and misconception is you know I don't have enough money or I don't really need a financial advisor.

Speaker 2: 3:08

Yeah, a lot of that you see on the internet is kind of general, you know, general information, not specific to any individual or their situation, and every situation is just a little bit different. So along our journey we've had some type of I don't know always a challenge or maybe obstacle that we've overcome. Is there something that happened along your journey that you can kind of look back at now? I know you mentioned your grandparents and what happened to them. Is there something happened, whether professionally or personally?

Speaker 3: 3:38

Yeah, I think I'd say I matured a little bit later than maybe some people have in their life, Definitely behind my wife. But I got fired from my last job. I just I just had it matured and I just wasn't a good employee for the type of company I was employed at for what they were looking for. But I thought I was invincible because I was hardworking and because I was smart and I knew what I could do and I was successful in terms of making money or getting sales.

Speaker 3: 4:09

But that doesn't mean you have job security, and so that was really a humbling moment for me to take that and really have to kind of look inward and say what's the common denominator in this? And it's going to be me at the end of the day. So having to change yourself first and becoming the person that you really see in the future has helped me to find more success in this career and in the things that I do now. So that's probably a big, big coming to Jesus moment you can say you can call it. That happened in my career.

Speaker 2: 4:40

And everybody, everybody has experiences like that. But the big part of it is that you learn, you grow and you move forward. So and it sounds like you, you've done that very well. So you mentioned you weren't from southwest florida originally. Where were you from originally?

Speaker 3: 4:54

I'm from bartow florida. It's near lakeland, uh, it's kind of central florida area, but, um, my wife's from Naples, so eight years ago we ended up coming down here for grad school and then just stayed because we have family and we like the beach and the warm weather.

Speaker 2: 5:10

So Estero is our home now Yep. Very nice. It's a great area. That's why we all live down here and that's why we all gravitated towards this. So I know you're very busy. You've got a lot going on but when you get a moment of free time, what do you enjoy doing?

Speaker 3: 5:27

uh, I'm a big disc golfer, um, so we live right next to the estero community park and it has a great disc golf course as well as a disc golf community, so I made a lot of friends, um, in that community. Uh, so I have a newborn son as well, so I'll take him in the stroller out on the disc golf course with some of my buds. It's a really relaxing and fun time. I've always grown up playing team sports, so it's kind of an individual sport. It's just you and your discs and the basket out there walking through nature. So it's always a good time and it's challenging, but it provides us a simple relaxation at the same time.

Speaker 2: 6:02

Absolutely, and being outside is something we all love down here yeah.

Speaker 3: 6:05

Just wear your sunscreen.

Speaker 2: 6:08

Especially me. I got to wear it on my head now. So do you notice anything trending within the industry lately, or changing?

Speaker 3: 6:16

With any industry or my industry, your industry, your industry.

Speaker 3: 6:19

Oh, yes, I mean.

Speaker 3: 6:22

The ability for the individual we call them retail investors to invest for themselves has grown with the advent of technology and just the exposure to you know what individuals can do, and so that's allowed for a lot of new money to come into the market and for young people like myself to become diversified early on.

Speaker 3: 6:45

In the past our parents really the only thing that they could do is invest in their 401k or they have their pension through work. But through the different types of investments that we can do now whether that's real estate in your IRA and your non-qualified account, your cryptocurrencies, things like that small businesses the diversification is a lot more and allows for, I think, young people like myself to really get involved early on, and that's really the name of the game. So it's time and compound interest the longer you're in the market and the more compound interest that you can earn is what's going to get you to have more money at the end of the day. It's time in the market, not timing the market Right. So that's probably one of the biggest things that I've seen change in the past five or 10 years five or 10 years.

Speaker 2: 7:33

That's great advice because a lot of people wait too late, you know, to start investing and doing the right thing. But if you start early, like you said, it compounds and it gets bigger and you get what you're looking for and more comfortable down the line. So how would our listeners go about contacting you if they had any questions or needed any assistance?

Speaker 3: 7:52

Yep, so our website. We have Omni Financial Services. I mentioned in the beginning. We have three different firms, so a lot of my clients down here in Southwest Florida are business owners or have owned businesses in the past. Coming from like a blue collar, black background. I enjoy working with business owners, especially in the trades. The construction industry down here is huge, so they can find us at. One of my companies is the CE Academy. We do continuing education workshops. Omniresourcegroup. com is our business consulting firm and then Omni Financial Services is where we provide a lot of the financial services for individuals and business owners here in Southwest Florida and really all over the state.

Speaker 2: 8:37

So yeah, very, very nice Any last words for our listeners.

Speaker 3: 8:45

No, I mean just, you know, find in this industry, if you've ever thought about working with somebody in it, it really comes down to who you trust at the end of the day. Build a relationship with somebody that you can be with longterm right. Everyone, I feel like, know somebody that's in this industry, so it's got you got to feel comfortable with somebody that you work with at the end of the day, I think that's going to be the biggest thing, biggest takeaway you can have.

Speaker 2: 9:07

Absolutely, absolutely. Hey, it's been a pleasure getting to know you today. Thank you for being such a good neighbor and I hope to see you out in the community soon, awesome.

Speaker 3: 9:16

Thank you, Jim.

Speaker 1: 9:17

Thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast, estero. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to gnpestero. com. That's gnpestero. com, or call 239-296-2621.