You Deserve to Be Rich with Earn Your Leisure’s Rashad Bilal 🏝️ E155

0:05Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to a very special edition of the Money Mondays podcast. we cover three core topics, how to make money, how to invest money, how to give it away to charity. This gentleman will be able to cover all those topics and more because he has his own podcast, his own live events, his own university and everything between teaching people the way I passionately do as well. He does it on a grand scale. He's been doing it for many, many years. As you guys know, these podcasts are under 40 minutes because the average workout is 45 minutes. The average commute to work is 45 minutes.

0:35This episode will be between 35 and 38 minutes for your listening pleasure. We want to keep this podcast ranked super high, and we have a 93 % listen-through rate because of you guys taking this content, sharing it with your friends, family, and followers, because we grew up thinking it's rude to talk about money, and I want to get rid of that mindset and that concept. We have to talk about money, finances, accounting, taxes, debt, leverage, credit. All these things are part of your daily life. Paying for bills, paying for groceries, paying for your family. There's nothing evil about that. A lot of people talk about money is the root of all evil.

1:06Money has function. Money is a tool to things all encompassing in your daily life. You need it. You want it. You have to have it. And we want to make sure that we can talk about it because over the course of time, you're going to need millions and millions and millions of dollars. Not for flashy things, not for fun, fancy cars, but to literally survive over the course of time for you, your family, and the people in your downline for the rest of eternity. You need to have capital. It is a tool. And so without further ado, Rashad, give us a quick two-minute bio so we get straight to the money. How are you doing?

1:39Yeah, I'm one of the co-founders of a company called Earn Your Leisure. And we started seven years ago and it's grown into an online community. We have a network of podcasts. We have a very large event called InvestFest. We wrote a book, which is a New York Times bestseller called You Deserve to Be Rich. You have school curriculum and a variety of other different things. But it's all centered around teaching people about financing, highlighting entrepreneurs, talking about investing and done in a way that's very digestible. And that started, as I said, seven years ago online on social media. And that's kind of grown into multifaceted media company today.

2:21So you deserve to be rich. Where did that title come from? You deserve to be rich. it came two different ways actually so another partner of ours on the show Market Mondays and a strong part of what we built in he has like a mantra where he says you deserve to be rich and that was like a seed that I guess was psychologically planted but I didn't even think about that when he was coming up with the title I felt like you deserve to be rich just kind of outlaws it from a psychological standpoint that most people don't think that they actually deserve wealth. And that, that leads to self-sabotaging.

2:59That leads to them not fulfilling, you know, the potential that they have. So you can give somebody all of the information, introduce them to people, you know, they, if they don't deep down believe that they actually are worthy of success or worthy of finances, um, then they're not going to actually go through with it. So the book is, is kind of a blueprint when it comes to, you know, personal finance and goes through the whole journey from the start to finish. But the title of the book felt like needed to actually catch people's attention, set the tone and also kind of like, you know, make it different than just a regular book about money.

3:50Right. Like it's not just about money. is also about the mindset because that's vitally important. So just coming up with different ideas around that idea and You Deserve to Be Rich was the go-to. Similarly, you have another cool name, which is the actual main brand name, which is Earn Your Leisure. How did that story come about? That story came about, I was a financial advisor before this and I had my own personal brand on social media that I was building before we started Earn Your Leisure. And I was making content based around my life, based around finance tips, based around a variety of different things that was growing my own personal page.

4:36And at that time, especially hashtags were really big. And hashtag almost was like a slogan. So you have an individual hashtag that's unique to you. and that's kind of become like your slogan. So I was looking for a hashtag that I could use for myself that had not been used before. And Troy, actually, my partner, he came up with the name Earn Your Leisure. He just came up with it. He was like, that's a good hashtag. That's something that you should use. And I used it. And right away, it just got people's attention. Like, I looked at the hashtag. You can see like if other people use it. and I saw other people was using the hashtag.

5:19Like people would be like, somebody was in Cancun and they like, earn your leisure. I didn't even know this person. So I'm like, it's catching leg. People were asking me like, if it was a multi-level marketing firm, like people was asking me and all I was doing was just putting it on my hashtag. Every post that I did, I would put earn your leisure, hashtag. Like, what is earn your leisure? What is earn your leisure? Like, you know what I'm saying? And I actually never did, I never really liked the name at first. I didn't like the name. I didn't really see, like, how it was going to catch on. It kind of seemed a little, like, cheesy to me.

5:50So I stopped using it for a while. And then another friend of mine, he had asked me, he's like, what happened to Ernie Alicia? Like, why'd you stop using it? I'm like, you like it? He's like, yeah, that was good. All right, cool. So I started using it again. And once again, it started to pick up traction. So when the time came for us to actually start a show, because that was the first thing that we did together, as far as on the online side. Started a podcast and asked Troy if he wanted to be my partner in the podcast. I said, yeah. So we were coming up with different ideas for the name of the show.

6:25And I had a name. I wanted to call it Money, Power, Respect. That's great. Troy had another name. We kind of went back and forth. But then we were like, look, we already have Earn Your Leisure. That's something that I've been using for a while. It's original. So we might as well just go with that. And that's what we named the show, Earn Your Leisure. And that started the whole Earn Your Leisure brand. So at what point did it add in the live event side? Live event side came early. We probably 16 weeks into us starting a show, we did a pop-up event in Carson, California. And that was just a spur of the moment thing.

7:08We were in California. We were shooting some content. Like I said, it was 16 weeks in. So we was relatively still early in the show. And another one of our friends had did a networking event in Atlanta a week before. And I saw it online and it looked pretty cool. Oh, this is a good idea, a networking event. So we just put online that we wanted to do an event in California. We was there. A restaurant owner hit us back. Like, look, I have a restaurant. I like you guys. I would love to host you. You know, you don't have to pay anything. We're like, all right, cool. So we did that event and the event, you know, it was a free networking event, but it was packed.

7:46Like probably 200 people came and people came from the IE. Some people came from San Diego. So that's when we knew like, okay, we had some because spur of the moment thing, Carson, California on like a, it was like a random Thursday or a Monday, something like that. And it was packed. So that led to us doing a series of networking events all over the country. We did one in Brooklyn. We did one in Atlanta. We did one in Houston. We did one in Chicago. We were just going around the country. We were doing free networking events. We were working out deals with the bars. We would pick like a Thursday.

8:17And we would sell merch. So we'd try to make some money from it. We'd get a percentage of the bar. The idea was just to kind of cover the cost of travel. But we wanted to just see how hot we actually were in person, but also like to gauge the interest of the people in different regions and just taking a model also like from just music. You know, you see like hip hop people go on promotional tours, promo tours, like before the album comes out. So we was doing that. And every stop, it got bigger. Every stop, it got bigger. I think the last stop that we did, I think it might have been Houston or Chicago, was like 600 people.

8:54It went from like 100 to 200, 300, 400, 500. And it just kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger. So at the time, so at that time, we got a good gauge of like this now. Now we start to do paid events. so the first paid event that we did was in Atlanta and it was a two-day event it was actually the day that Kobe died um because I remember we had made that announcement to the audience and that was crazy but we did that event and it sold out um I think we sold like probably 500 tickets and it was a live podcast one day then like an educational workshop the next day and then we're like okay now this is a model that we can replicate so we started doing that model again we went to DC We did the same thing that we did in Atlanta.

9:37We did it in D.C. Then we were scheduled for Philadelphia, and that's when COVID hit. So, like, literally, like, three days before our event, because COVID, it kept building up. We kept hearing about it, but still nobody was really 100 % sure what was going on. Yeah, but March 19th, it became real. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, like, three days before our event, that's when everything shut down. And we had to cancel the event, like, three days before the event. So that was kind of sucked because we put a lot of work into that. We was really, really looking forward to it. But we canceled the event in Philly.

10:10And then we took a break, obviously, because COVID. And then actually Marcus, him 500, we went to his event. He had an event like probably like a year later when people started to pick up events. He did an event in Miami. And we saw his event. And that was like real inspiring. So we knew we wanted to come back to the event space because that was something that we did before. But we wanted to see how we could do something different. And at the time, everybody, you know, a lot of people had business conferences, business symposiums in the world of business, but wanted to see how we could do something that had never really been done before.

10:44So I thought about having a festival and like really like not just using the word festival, but like actually having a festival built around business. So that's where InvestFest came in. And we kind of looked at what music festivals do and what other type of culturally relevant festivals do, the framework for it. And we took from that and added like the traditional business conference model and put them together. And then that was InvestFest. And so that's how we got InvestFest. How big was the first one? 4 ,000, 4 ,500 people. Wow, that's big. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was big off the gate, I mean, relatively.

11:28And we only had eight weeks to plan. So we started it. We had eight weeks to plan. And we put together the whole thing in about a month and a half. And, yeah, so, you know, InvestFest out the gate. It was really good. And then from there, the anticipation had just built. And then following that, we did a few different things. and we did an interview with Steve Harvey. And that interview went viral. And during that, after the interview, we spoke with Steve Harvey. He just took a liking to everything that we had going on. He wanted to work with us. So he's like, come up with some ideas for us to work together.

12:07So we pitched him the idea of him coming on as a partner of InvestFest. And he came on as a partner. And then the next year for InvestFest year two, he was one of the headliners. And then he also got us Tyler Perry as a headliner. And then, yeah, that was like 14 ,000 people. 14 ,000? Yeah. Jesus. So then it just, yeah, every year from there. So you got 25 ,000 at the recent one. Yeah. What's your plan for 2026?

12:382026, scale, scale. And not just in the way of people. Every year we add to InvestFest. So like the pitch, we added a pitch competition two years ago for$100 ,000. Last year we did a pitch competition. we actually gave away$250 ,000,$125 ,000 to each person. We added Friday programming two years ago. This year, last year, it was the first year we added like full day Friday programming. So now it's like a full day. It's three days. It's a real three day. Because at first it was just two days. Then we kind of dipped our toe in with the Friday to make it three days. But now it's all day on Friday workshops.

13:15So we added that aspect to it. So vendor marketplace has grown every year. We have around 400 small business to large business vendors inside of our vendor marketplace. So really, that's really the focus is to like, how can we make the experience better and better every year for people coming to InvestFest? So, you know, from speakers to, you know, the vendor marketplace, pitch competitions, different value ads. so that's definitely in the works for this year why should people go to invest fest and events like it um it's something that you really can't get online as far as the online education is great you can learn a lot online but you know the key to success well one of the keys to success one of the keys to our success is relationships and so there's a few things i think that you get from a live event like InvestFest.

14:13You get the education. That's one thing, right? Like you actually get to sit in on panels. And I feel like if you can go, if you can't learn something in three days, you're not trying to learn, right? Over a hundred panels, workshops. I mean, a variety of different things that's happening. So you're going to learn something in person. That's one thing from an educational standpoint. You're going to get inspired. And that's not talking about enough either. Because like I said, InvestFest comes from us being inspired. So we started something with tremendous amount of scale in a very short period of time because we saw something.

14:44If we didn't actually go to that event, we might not have gotten inspired to do InvestFest. So the inspiration, I think, is something that you get in person. The relationships, like that's probably the biggest part for me. It's like you're in an atmosphere with 25 ,000 like-minded people. It's not just 25 ,000 people. You could go to a basketball game with 25 ,000 people, not know one person and then leave. But if people actually pay for a ticket, they pay for a hotel, they've taken time out of their weekend. A lot of people travel, they're not from Atlanta, so they got to get, you know, all the plane ticket, everything that goes in.

15:23These are serious people, right? So you're around 25 ,000 like-minded people over the course of a weekend. if you don't make at least five very valuable relationships, like you're going about it the wrong way. And these relationships can change your life. And I've heard stories of a changing life. People have met their real estate partner. People have met somebody that invested in their business. People have met their wife or their husband, right? So I feel like a lot of times people, they always say like you are the greater sum of like your seven closest friends. But what if you don't have seven productive friends?

15:59What if you're in a place where nobody in your neighborhood or your environment is thinking how you think, right? Like, well, you have to get out of that environment. And it may not be like a permanent move, but it may be an intentional escape to establish different relationships, different friends and different levels of connection. So that to me is huge. Like, you know, you never know who you're going to meet at InvestFest. Everybody's there. And like I said, just from a vendor marketplace, the VIP night, just walking down the halls, being in the actual seminars. So that aspect of it, I think, is really big as well.

16:39So a few different reasons why people should go to events that you can't. Because that's some people say like, well, anything that you can learn at an event, you can learn online. And that may be true from an educational standpoint. but if you're only going to an event for an educational standpoint, I think you're missing a lot of other key elements. Sure. I'm obsessed with events. I throw 42 events a year. The experience is how we build memories and how we forge relationships. We'll remember if we went to a concert together. We'll remember if we went to Best Fest together. We'll remember those moments, even years and years and years later.

17:18Oftentimes we retain information for a while and only percentage of it stays in our minds, but those relationships last. for hopefully for a lifetime. What about EYL University? Talk us through the online university and why is it important for someone to go there versus going through a traditional college or traditional online information? Yeah, I mean, EYL University, so we have the platform for Earn Your Leisure is we have Instagram page, we have TikTok, we have all the social media. We post content all day on that. Then we have three shows under the umbrella. We have a show, Earn Your Leisure, where we interview entrepreneurs.

17:54We have a show called Market Mondays, which is a stock investment show. It happens every Monday. Then we have a show called Blackout, which is like a late night opinion-based show. You learn different things from different shows that you watch or the different content that we post. And you can definitely utilize that information to change your life because people have done it, right? Like you can watch an episode about real estate and actually go and buy a multifamily home. You can watch Market Mondays and actually start investing in the stock market and make 50 % on your money in one year, potentially if you get the right stock.

18:28That's happened. Those are real stories that have actually happened. But I like to say it's similar to a public school versus private school. That, what I just described, all of that is free. And everybody, there's no barrier entry for it. Everybody has access to Wi-Fi, you can watch it. but some people want a more hands-on learning approach. Some people want more of a hands-on community. So how we built out EY University is not like just an online course. It's actually an institution. So we have regional groups, in-person regional groups. So we have a DC group. We have a Chicago group. We have a South Florida group.

19:06We have an LA group. We have a New York group. And these are regional chapters where people meet together with different people that's part of EY University. And then they'll go out. They'll go out for bowling. They'll do community service. But once again, the relationships, right, they get to build relationships with people that's close to them. We have classes that happen that we don't have the capacity to have on YouTube because there's just not enough time. So like Troy, he does stock options. He'll teach a two hour stock options class every month. Market Mondays is only a two hour show. It's not designed to actually sit, go through a chart, go through the fundamentals of a company.

19:43Like it's that's it's not the framework for that. Right. So when you get that in-depth teaching in EYL University, I was a financial advisor for 14 years. So one of the things that I started when I went online, I was offering people free consultations. Like you could book a 30-minute call with me. But I didn't have the capacity for that anymore, obviously. But now with EYL University, I do monthly calls with people for EYL University. and it's just like a free flowing session. Ask me any question you want about investing, about business, about marketing, about college savings, about retirement.

20:22And I'm literally just sitting down answering questions. It's a one-on-one in a group setting, right? Like I don't have the capacity to do that on shows. We bring in experts in the field to actually teach about real estate or teach about credit or different things of that nature. So we've really jam-packed the curriculum with anything that you want to learn about, there's a video for it. And then there's ongoing lessons, tutorials. There's a community. We have an app. So there's a community that talks every single day, especially on the investing side. What are you looking at? You know, I just found this company.

20:57Da-da-da-da. And they go back and forth all the time. We have investment clubs inside of it where people actually, you know, learn about cryptocurrency and what's happening. So it's an extension of what we're already doing with the online YouTube, Apple, Spotify, Instagram, but it's just more in-depth. And like I said, that's something that we don't have the capacity to do that on YouTube, but we have the capacity to do it online, but in a different version, which is EY University. So that's for people that really want the hands-on learning experience, people that are serious, people that just want to cut directly through, get exactly what they want, put together, you know, put themselves in places with people that's like-minded to themselves in person events different things of that nature so that's the framework behind EO University.

21:48What do you think is what holds people back from making more money? A lot of people get stuck at 40k and 60k 80k a year and then they're complacent what do you think holds them back from making more money and starting to invest? Scalability like I think at every level right like as far as how can you replicate yourself, right? If you're an entrepreneur, it's like how, if you're whatever you're doing to make$40 ,000,$50 ,000 a year, what is, what's the pathway to 10X that? And that's what, and sometimes you have to change industries almost to actually, because me as a financial advisor, that's why I started this whole online thing.

22:31I saw a ceiling for myself of making, you know, six figures. And I just sat down and I was young at that time, but I just looked at everything that was like working against me. And I'm like, okay, like in order to make money as a financial advisor, I got to talk to people, got to close deals. I have to have either a tremendous amount of deal flow coming in, which that's difficult to get hundreds of clients on a monthly basis. or I got to work with less clients, but extremely wealthy clients. But I'm like, okay, I don't really have access to extremely wealthy people. So that's why my first idea was sports and entertainment.

23:09I wanted to build an online platform to become a celebrity financial advisor so I could work with athletes and entertainers because I felt like that would be able to scale my business. But even that was kind of a still limited model. So I'm like, okay, well, I could still talk about the same things that I'm talking about as far as personal finance and retirement and investing and different things in insurance. But if I could reach thousands, hundreds of thousands, potentially even millions of people, that's a way to scale my message. So I saw Instagram as that way, to actually be able to grow and scale without having me sitting down, booking appointments, somebody canceling at the last minute, traveling an hour and a half to tell somebody, for somebody to tell me that they're not ready, they got to talk to their wife.

24:03So it's like, you know, but that required me to go to a different industry. Same framework, same idea, but I went from wealth management to media. But taking what I was talking about in wealth management and taking it over to media. So I think that that's something a lot of times, you know, you just have to realize like some industries or some times in life, you're in circumstances that you're up against bad odds as far as your scalability. But it doesn't necessarily mean you have to do something completely different, but you might have to look at different avenues to take what you're passionate about, take your skill set and scale it.

24:47So someone starts to make more money. They get up to 100K a year, 120, 140, 160. They start growing in their career over the course of time. At what point should they be considering investing, whether it's the stock market, real estate, cashflow and businesses, et cetera. At what point do you think that they should start at least researching or starting to invest from the capital they're earning from their core job? You should start investing as soon as you have enough money to pay your bills. As soon as you have enough money to pay your bills, you have money left over, which is called discretionary income.

25:16That's when you really start to have to do something with that and think about it. So whether it's putting money in a 401k, whether it's having a life insurance policy, whether it's having a 529 plan for your kid, whether it's investing money into stocks, over and above any money that you absolutely have to have to live, which is your rent, your mortgage, you know, groceries, your light bill, your cell phone bill, anything over and above that is all discretionary. You don't have to invest every single penny of that because, you know, you do have some leisure that you're going to do. You're going to go out.