Coffee With E
Welcome to Coffee with E—where great conversations meet inspiration! ☕✨
This podcast is for dreamers, go-getters, and those on a journey of self-growth. Whether you’re building a business, navigating relationships, or working on your mindset, you’ll find motivation, wisdom, and real-life stories to help you level up.
Each week, we dive into topics like self-worth, mental well-being, wealth-building, leadership, and entrepreneurship—always with a mix of honesty, luxury, and a little fun. If you love deep conversations, personal growth, and a good cup of coffee, this is the podcast for you!
Join me, Erica Rawls, and my guests as we keep it real, inspire action, and remind you that anything is possible if you’re willing to do the work. Subscribe now and let’s dream big together! ☕✨
Don't forget to like, comment, and subscribe!
📌 Follow this link and let's get social--->
📧 For inquiries and collaborations, email us at: customercare@ericarawls.com
Coffee With E
Financial Freedom Starts Here: Wealth-Building Tips for 2025
Are you tired of living paycheck to paycheck or wondering how to start building real wealth? In this episode of Coffee with E, I’m sharing the mindset shifts and strategies that helped me get out of debt and take control of my financial future. We’ll talk about why delaying gratification matters, how to boost your credit score, and how small changes can lead to big financial wins. If homeownership, investing, or financial stability are your goals, this episode is for you.
Follow Coffee with E on YouTube and Instagram for more real talk on wealth-building, success, and living the life you deserve.
#PersonalFinance #WealthBuilding #MoneyMindset #DebtFreeJourney #FinancialFreedom
Follow Us for More Inspiration:
📸 Instagram: @erica.rawls
🎥 YouTube: Erica Rawls
📧 For inquiries and collaborations: customercare@ericarawls.com
✨ Don't forget to like, comment, and subscribe to stay updated with our latest episodes!
Hey you, so you know what I was thinking. This episode, episode 28,. Can you believe it? Episode 28 is here. This one was created as a result to the answers or the questions that I was receiving over the past couple months. A lot of women are looking for ways to financially support themselves. Even if you're married, you still want to feel financially stable in order to do the things that you truly want to do. In this particular episode, we will be addressing how to delay gratification, what it actually means, what it does not mean, and how you, too, can start making the right decisions in order for you to start building wealth to fund the life that you truly live.
Erica Rawls:So sit back, grab your coffee, get ready for work, listen on your way to a commute, and I would love to hear your thoughts and your takeaways, because this is chapter one of many episodes to come specifically on this topic. Hey you, so I've been thinking. I've been thinking about the person that has come up to me multiple times since November, and you know what they've been asking. Hey, erica, I want to purchase. Hey, erica, I want to invest. Hey, erica, I want to build my credit, and they just don't know how to do it. They want to purchase, they want to invest, but they don't have the credit to do it, nor they may not have the cash. So I wanted to talk to you all, ladies, about how to build wealth, and it does start with your credit. Yes, you can buy without having good credit. There are ways to do it, and yet I believe in making sure that you are set up for the most success, because, with good credit, you'll be able to purchase using the least amount of money. You'll have that many more options by you focusing on building your credit. I want to take two seconds to share with you that this particular episode is brought to you by Rob Shaw and Allstate Insurance. If you're looking for someone to give you insurance, whether it's home insurance, car insurance go to him. He is your guy. Thank you, rob, for sponsoring this show.
Erica Rawls:So, one of the things I know that we don't like to do, ladies, we don't like to defer our gratification. What do I mean by that? That means that we don't buy that purse, we don't buy those fancy shoes or the clothes, the outfits and, even more granular than that, we don't like to delay getting our nails done or even getting our hair done right. Those are just some of the things that we don't like to do. And yet if we do that, maybe for let's just say, 90 days, six months, a whole year how much money will we save? I know for me when I go to get my hair done and my nails done, money will we save. I know for me when I go to get my hair done and my nails done it's going to cost me upwards of 150 bucks, right, probably on a good day if we're talking manicure, pedicure and hair, right, and then we're not even talking about getting eyebrows done. We're not talking about getting you know, all the things done. So if you sit down and calculate how much it costs you to live, or how much does it cost you for just the cosmetics of feeling good Now, I'm not saying taking away self-care, that's not what I'm saying.
Erica Rawls:But what I am saying is perhaps maybe even a cup of coffee from Starbucks they used to be $5 and now they're $15. Nuts Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating a little bit, but I'm not far off. So, instead, why don't you buy a bag of coffee, grind it up and make it at home? So, instead of getting a manicure or a pedicure, why don't you have a mani-pedi day with your friends, right? Or find a friend that's really good at it and maybe even make it a party. By doing that, you're going to be able to save a lot of money. Or how about the friend that likes to do braids or likes to put in weaves or extensions or do all those things? Or a friend that's in cosmetology school, that's really good at it, but she's just not licensed, is willing to do it for a discount. There's ways about getting those things done.
Erica Rawls:If you're the person that likes to spend on clothes, why can't we go to a thrift store? That sounds kind of grimy, right? If you're anything like me, I'm thinking, okay, someone might have wore those clothes, but just think about the person that don't have those options. There's some really good finds. I know for a fact because my cousin she loves one of my cousins love to shop at thrift stores, love it, and she finds some really good stuff. Things that you would not even think you could find are found at thrift stores. We're talking nice leather jackets. We're talking with the vintage Louis Vuitton bags. We're talking all the things are found at thrift stores. So do not sleep on the thrift stores, ladies.
Erica Rawls:I'm telling you, hey, I'm hoping you're enjoying this episode of Coffee with E. I had to take 30 seconds to share with you one of our sponsors for this episode, top Construction. They are a premier construction company located in central PA, so if you live in Dauphin, cumberland, lancaster and Lebanon counties, you want to check them out. Not only are they reliable, they are reasonable and they get the job done. Now let's go back to the episode.
Erica Rawls:So what are some ways you can also build up your credit? Okay, so we figured out how to save money by deferring or delaying our gratification. How serious are you to do that in order for you to get the things that you truly want? One other thing before we go into how to actually build credit, you may want to think about alternatives to those long vacations abroad. Maybe this year is not the year. Perhaps you want to take little weekend trips, but little weekend trips can actually cost you a lot of money too. Let's forget the cruise this year. Instead, perhaps we can go to a beach a local beach or we can go to a beach a local beach. Or we can go to a Broadway play. There's other things that you can do that's going to be able to help you to get to where you want to go. So, once you save up your credit, now let's talk about how we can build your credit or save money, excuse me, now let's talk about how we can actually increase your credit. Now let's talk about how we can actually increase your credit.
Erica Rawls:One of the best ways that I found that's really quick and easy. If you have the ability to do it, it may go against. You know, most people's way of thinking is you want to find someone that actually is in your family that does have good credit. This is not the first option, but this is like an extreme hey, I need to find a house right away, or I need to do something right away and I need to boost my credit. You potentially could be a cosigner when someone actually has really good credit, but that's not the first thing I want to share with or want to advise you to do. Let that be the last thing that you want to do. One of the first things you want to do is you want to put yourself on a budget Okay, and you want you want to use the snowball effect when it comes to decreasing your debt. The first thing I want you to do. That's probably going to be the most painful is see how much debt you actually have. When's the last time you actually opened up all of your mail or your emails and looked at your balances, your credit balances? How many credit cards do you actually have? Figure out how much debt you're in, rip the bandaid off and get real serious about what you need to do in order for you to get out of debt. Big thank you to Sugaring NYC Harrisburg for sponsoring this episode. It's because of them we're able to bring this great content to you. Are you searching for a fabulous place that does lashes and eyebrows, that slay or hair removal that just makes you feel so great? You want to check them out. Now, back to our show. Can I share something with you?
Erica Rawls:I, too, used to be an absorbent amount of debt crazy debt, crazy. I would be hiding things from my husband all the time, and it wasn't until I got really real with the fact that, hey, I'm not only hurting myself, but also my family overall that I decided that we have to figure out a different way. So this is what we did I actually came clean with my husband. Oh my gosh, I remember that day like it was yesterday y'all. I remember it, I could have cried Now. For us it wasn't like an absorbent amount of debt, it was just the fact that it was debt At the time. I think it was maybe it was like $10,000 that I had accumulated in credit card debt all by myself, like how, who does that? I did that. So what we did was we listed all the debts and I did it in an Excel spreadsheet and we did what we call a still ball effect. You probably heard it before, right? So we took the one that had the highest balance and we also took it. But we also documented exactly how high our interest rates were too. So, highest balance, the interest rates.
Erica Rawls:I decided to focus on the balance because I was looking for the small wins. You may want to go after the one that has the highest interest rate, whatever feels most comfortable for you, and it's going to allow you to feel like you win. What we did was we took $50 extra on top of it was like $150 was the monthly payment. So I decided I wanted to pay $200. So we paid $200 on that one bill over a course of was 90 to 180 days. We were able to pay off that one. So that $200 plus whatever that $25 for the next bill was.
Erica Rawls:I'm exaggerating, it wasn't $25. I think it was actually $75. We were able to pay off. So $75 plus the $250. If we do the math real quick, don't be judging me. Is that $325? I think so. So we're going to go with $325.
Erica Rawls:Just in case you don't know, these episodes are brought to you and funded majority from my real estate team, the Erica Ross team. So thank you for continuing to support this channel. And if you're looking to sponsor in any way, one of the best gifts you can give us is a referral. So if you know anyone that's looking to buy or to sell, reach out to us. We are here to help. So at $325, we're able to pay that off within two months. You see how this is going. Then you take the $325 plus whatever the minimum balance is for your next one until you actually pay it off. But don't forget to do something. Celebrate every single time that you pay something off. Celebrate the small wins. That's going to help you dramatically. So you do that until you pay everything off.
Erica Rawls:The other thing while you're paying everything off, you want to look at your credit score too. Look at your credit score and see how it actually starts improving. So you start to feel better for yourself. And hey, guess what? If you're looking to purchase a home, your minimum credit score middle score can be as low as a 580. But don't come to me saying you have a 580 middle score because we want you to win. We want you to have a home that's going to cost you the least amount of money. So I'm recommending your middle score to purchase a home to be 680. So you want to take away the highest and lowest and that middle score 680, that's what you want to take away the highest and lowest and that middle score 680. That's what you want. And once you get that, that's when you're going to give us a call.
Erica Rawls:I hope you found this helpful because, if anything for 2025, if you're following me on Instagram, facebook and here on this channel, you know I don't want anything else but for you to win, and you can't do it. I want you to get yourself out of debt so you can do the things that you choose to do, and it's not going to be easy. And it's funny because I used to say this to myself all the time. Why am I mad? Because I'm in this situation. I have to go through this practice of discipline to get out of debt when I was having fun getting in it. What kind of sense does that make? Nothing worthwhile is going to be easy y'all. Just remember that. If you want someone to root you on, just know I'm your biggest cheerleader and I cannot wait to meet you all in the comments.
