Empowering Communities Through Credit Unions and Socially Responsible Banks - Expert Edition Episode 38 (Classic Episode)
We are bringing back another heavy hitter! We continue the series on responsible. We highlighted Greenwood Bank as it was up and coming, founded by Killer Mike, Ryan Glover, and a former mayor of Atlanta, with a focus on social justice and equity.
The bank offers grants to black and Latinx business owners and is positioned as a socially responsible alternative. We also compare credit unions to traditional banks, emphasizing the community-focused nature of credit unions and the benefits of becoming a member. We then cover how credit unions provide opportunities for members to have a say in how the institution's profits are used, potentially aligning with your values and community interests.
About Our Guest:
Marie Thomasson, CFP® is a financial advisor for progressive women. Marie started her journey with a prestigious internship in asset management after studying Applied Mathematics at UCLA. It turned into 13 long years, overseeing over six billion dollars in bonds for pension funds, institutions, and banks. The experience left her with a deep skillset, and a deeper longing to be free of an industry saturated in privilege, misogyny, and self-interest.
https://modernassetsla.com/
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TRANSCRIPT:
[00:00:00] Naseema McElroy: Hey, nurses on fire, super honored to have our CFP Marie Thomasson here. And we are going to continue on our series of talking about responsible investing. We covered already like an introduction to what socially responsible investing is sustainable investing is. Then we covered, how you hit the easy button to start saving responsibly. So where to put your savings in a responsible bank. Okay. And we can talk about that and I'm doing air quotes, which you probably can't see, but where to put your money.
So that was the easy. That was the easy button today. We're going to dive into a little bit. It's a little bit more complex way to save Responsibly so marie take it away.
[00:00:55] Marie Thomasson: All right So yeah, I think that as we already talked about last week, you know if it's easy and that's what you can do then you do it But if you don't mind putting in a little bit more work, then there's always ways to be even more thoughtful with where you save your money and have more of an impact that said.
Just this week, I was reading some press on a an up and coming competitor for Aspiration Bank. So before we move on, I want to just quickly talk about that because it's called Greenwood Bank and back in June after all the protests and the writing started Three guys got together and it's Killer Mike, Ryan Glover, and then I don't know if it's the current or a past Mayor of Atlanta.
I don't have his name in front of me, but if it's
[00:01:52] Naseema McElroy: a man, it's the past mayor.
[00:01:54] Marie Thomasson: Oh, that's right. Thank you for being on top of politics. Not really. Yes, so that's right. So anyways, it's called Greenwood Bank and Greenwood. Atlanta is where the former basically Black Wall Street started.
And it was I did a little bit of reading, and in 1921, there was riots and protests in the opposite direction, and they basically obliterated it over, basically race protests. And Greenwood Bank, in honor of Black Wall Street is, I would say like the social justice equivalent.
To aspiration, which I think is amazing aspiration. We've already talked about it. It's really about this ESG stuff. It's about being, sustainability, environmental topics or, concern. But if where your values lie is with Social justice, social equity. Then Greenwood Bank is like the new easy button.
And I think that's pretty phenomenal because it's been really hard to do anything in what they call the impact space. To have a really targeted focus on things that you your values and now greenwood bank is one of those options so I am The one thing to mind is just like aspiration. It is still a for profit bank.
I didn't see Anywhere on its website that it's a b corp it's black owned which you know already puts it heads and shoulders above the pack of options, I think that if They've got a good option for checking. I'm all in or, if they can do business banking, whatever it is, if they can do that and do it well, because it's all online, they've got big backers.
It's going to be a good experience and they've got all sorts of things that they're doing that are really, They're putting money in their pocket. There's no, way around that but every month They're giving 10, 000 to a black or Latinx Business owner, they're giving grants.
So they're
[00:04:02] Naseema McElroy: actually giving it. These aren't business loans. These are actual grants. These
[00:04:07] Marie Thomasson: are actual grants. Wow. Yes. And I should preface this all by saying that the bank isn't up and running yet, so they're taking applications. I just submitted one. I'm like 93, 000 on the list. And so they're going to start opening up for business in January.
So we'll know a whole lot more. After January and maybe that's a a good topic to revisit when and when we've more information on it, but definitely and i'll make sure that i've got information on greenwood in the show notes that is You know, that's the social justice equivalent of the easy button, it doesn't get much easier than that.
So now to move on now that said so this is amazing And I, I'm so excited to see the progress that's happening. But I want to move on to the super boring always, faithful credit unions. And, it's an open question, actually. Are you better off banking with, someone like Greenwood or going to a credit union?
What's the difference? Why is it better like Greenwood and I to be honest, I don't know for sure. I don't actually have the answer to that I think that Greenwood has huge advantages in the social justice space But when it comes down to it Credit unions, they've been around, you know a long time.
They're well established And they're very community focused, and that's something that Greenwood Bank can't necessarily be or do because they're an online bank. And so when we think about how to have an impact in our communities, then credit unions still hold, hold a place and a really important place because they're still going to be a place where you can get loans and banking services for much, usually it's almost always cheaper.
You have better terms. They're going to give you an auto loan on a, a car with 150, 000 miles, if that's what you can afford. And they you know, it's like the same people you go into the bank and you see the same people over and over again There's a lot of it's
[00:06:24] Naseema McElroy: a real community feel I only use credit unions and that's exclusively why And they can like really help you on a level that a big bank can't because they know you And so you can go in there and ask for things that are off the books for say for example I wanted a car loan, but I only wanted to pay 1.
49% because I knew that's the rate that would be offered if I would have went through the car companies, but I didn't want to go through the car company. I wanted to go through my credit union and I said, I got approved for this rate. Will you match it? It's not on their books, but yeah, they send it to their underwriter and lo and behold, they matched it because that's where I want to keep my money.
And yeah, I love that about the credit union.
[00:07:07] Marie Thomasson: Yeah. And I think that something an important distinction to make is this idea of a bank and a credit union. The fundamental difference is that the bank's profit goes to the shareholders. So it's going to the investors and the credit union.
The shareholders are the members. The shareholders are the employees. So either you're going to get like dividend bonuses where you get low rates or which, I think is a good thing or the employees get like better health care or better benefits or higher pay, to keep them in that job and have, like a sustainable income.
[00:07:52] Naseema McElroy: But also you're a, but also you're a member, so you also get a vote on where that money is going, right? Essentially. Exactly. And so you actually have a say on how your money is spent.
[00:08:02] Marie Thomasson: Yeah, but I think one of the biggest criticisms of credit unions is man, some of them are just like a pain in the ass to, to use or like their technology is from like 1955 are they like handwriting out their deposit slips still, like This is one of the big challenges and I think that it misrepresents credit unions generally because there's a lot of really amazing credit unions.
One of my first real jobs, not as a nanny, was at a credit union. That was my first job processing mortgage loans. And they're just as concerned about like the bottom line as a bank is, but they've got a different, the profit motive is different, right? How was your credit union?
How are they on the tech?
[00:08:52] Naseema McElroy: You know what, actually my credit union is pretty good. And I think I've seen a shift now because I think things are a little bit easier or they've gotten that push because of a lot of online banks that they had to step up. So my tech is actually pretty good. And I love my credit union because guess what?
I live right across the street too.
[00:09:12] Marie Thomasson: Yeah, that's where it doesn't get better than that. I think that everybody's got an ATM card and credit cards. And we're not in like 1995, taking a trip to. I don't know, New York. And, we don't know where to get money.
Right.
[00:09:27] Naseema McElroy: The thing is that too, like a lot of pushback from credit unions was like ATM access because they're not national. But actually credit unions have a bigger yeah. Network of ATMs. Cause yeah, I can go to Costco and use the ATM. I can go to Walgreens or CVS and use their ATMs.
And I can also go to seven 11s. Now, there's one of those on every corner.
[00:09:47] Marie Thomasson: So sadly, yes. So it's like the unsung hero. It, it really is. And, I, I think as long as you can open it up an account online, chances are they're going to have the services you need.
Right.
[00:10:05] Naseema McElroy: Yeah. And another thing about credit unions is people think that you might have to be like typically they're established because of some kind of affiliation. There's Navy federal credit union, or there's like these different kinds of credit unions. And it used to be that their regulations were just like, yeah, you have to be in this affiliated group.
But I think like Even that those things have loosened up. So pretty much if you have money to deposit, you can become a member at any credit union. But it does align with certain values.
[00:10:37] Marie Thomasson: Yeah, it does. So sometimes there's, a lot of them are like on good faith.
Did you work here? Did you go to school here? Are you part of this community? Or church? Whatever the case is, but there's also a lot of Community credit unions are like are you a member of this community? And so I think unless you live in a really small town where you're going to get poor service that's when it maybe makes more sense to find an online alternative But otherwise if you live in any major metropolitan area, Like you can spend so much time Going down the rabbit hole of trying to look at these credit unions and which ones are good and bad.
But if you look at reviews, all the banks have bad reviews. I would say don't overthink it too much because, it's going to be insured. It's, it has a different type of insurance than banking insurance. There's a specific insurance for credit unions, but I've never heard horror stories about credit unions setting you up with accounts or overcharging you or pushing product on you for that matter that you don't need for whatever hassle you, you have to, hoop, you have to jump through to set up the account, like on the flip side, you're also not badgered.
[00:11:57] Naseema McElroy: And I think like a lot of people just like any other bank a lot of people will say I either use credit unions or don't use credit unions. And the thing is this just like all the other banks, there are so many different types of credit unions. They all have different technology.
They all have different access. And so you can't like If you don't find a credit union that suits your needs try another one because they all have different features And so don't be anti credit union just for the simple fact that you went to one and they were handwriting out Receipts. Okay, that's pretty unique Try another one because there's probably one that's going to meet your needs and I love the community focus i've been a part of some really.
Awesome credit unions. And we've talked about people's credit unions, how they give back to the community and the communities that I specifically was born and raised in. And so that was really important to me to become a member of that bank, even though they didn't have all the bells and whistles, you pay the cost a little bit to have your money go to places that matter to you,
[00:13:01] Marie Thomasson: exactly. Yeah, I the way I like to describe this is you're a citizen before a consumer like you're a citizen consumer, not just a consumer. And so this is a way of doing that just like voting, hopefully, which everyone is doing right now. It's, that's a way to, to fulfill that citizen obligation to, An amazing country that we're part of and making it better is to really make it better in the communities that we live in.
And that's one way to do it because you're definitely going to do that by utilizing one of the big banks. Yes,
[00:13:38] Naseema McElroy: Yes. So if you want to make an impact, especially locally in your community, credit unions are a failsafe way to do that. But also there's a lot of different credit unions and they all have and support different causes and they all have and support different community needs.
And so make sure you reference that against what you really want. And I'm going to call, I'm like, I'm a credit union advocate, so I might be a little biased, but I'm just like, yes, credit unions all the way I don't and haven't had an account with a major bank in. But outside of credit cards years and years because I just I've had really bad experiences and I've had such positive uplifting experiences with credit union.
So I am a credit union
[00:14:28] Marie Thomasson: fan girl. Good. I can't wait for next week to talk about the, the, like the ultimate way. To save your money in like the most impactful way, because it's basically just a subset of credit unions. So you're going to love this and hopefully everybody listening will too.
So
[00:14:50] Naseema McElroy: I'm super excited and I can't wait for you guys to join us next week to talk about that. Yeah.
Hey there I’m Naseema
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