We were lucky to catch up with Tiffany Vogel recently and have shared our conversation below.
Tiffany, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Can you share an important lesson you learned in a prior job that’s helped you in your career afterwards?
I was incredibly fortunate to secure a paid internship during my junior year of college, which not only introduced me to my field but also led to a full-time job offer. As an analyst with the sales team, I supported them with various financial and non-financial metrics. This role opened doors for travel, allowed me to meet amazing people, and eventually led to a telework position—before remote work became mainstream. During my travels, I noticed that most of the leadership had been with the company for over 20 years, inspiring me to lay down roots and build my career there.
Over the years, I climbed the ranks and found myself in a management position with a sister company. Continuing to work remotely, I moved closer to my family and bought my first house. Around this time, I started a relationship with my now-husband, and life was on an exciting trajectory! We decided to invest in real estate to build passive income and eventually achieve the time freedom to travel with our future family. Our journey began early on; during our second date, we made repairs to his home so he could rent it out.
We dove into learning about real estate and began building a portfolio while continuing our careers. After a decade at my company, I faced an unexpected dilemma: relocate to a corporate office or find a new position within 60 days. Moving across the country wasn’t feasible as I was establishing a new life and investing in local real estate. Thankfully, a former boss helped me secure a new position just in time.
This experience taught me that job security can sometimes be an illusion. Despite my 10-year tenure and stellar performance reviews, my job wasn’t guaranteed. Fortunately, we were well on our way to financial freedom through real estate, allowing me to work a few more years before transitioning full-time to entrepreneurship. Many people equate a consistent paycheck with stability, but I realized that having multiple income streams was more important. If one source decreased or disappeared, we could still support my household. I also learned that employees are taxed at a higher rate, and by investing in real estate and owning my business, I could keep more of what I made each year.
After four years of investing, my husband and I welcomed our first son and became full-time investors. Since then, we’ve both started other businesses, including my financial coaching firm. Now, I empower small business owners to take control of their finances and leverage their numbers for strategic decisions. I have the flexibility to focus on what aligns with my purpose and raise my three little boys. I live a life I truly love, and it all stemmed from facing what seemed like an impossible decision at the time.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
After spending a decade in healthcare finance and data analytics, and earning a Master’s in Finance from Georgetown University, I made the bold decision to leave my corporate job to embrace entrepreneurship and focus on my growing family. Our business thrived, and I realized our success stemmed from my unique ability to translate complex financials into actionable decisions.
Having achieved financial freedom through real estate, I took a significant leap and founded Insight CFO Services in 2023. Our mission is to help medium to large-sized businesses (typically $6M+ in revenue) achieve massive success without the stress of day-to-day or strategic financial management. We specialize in reviewing monthly financials and leveraging data to drive decisions, from hiring new employees to making large-scale investments.
By the end of 2024, I recognized a gap in support for smaller business owners. Many haven’t been exposed to formal financial best practices and struggle to leverage their financial data for business decisions or tax strategies. This realization led to the creation of Energetic CFO, an educational and financial coaching company dedicated to empowering small businesses. I focus on teaching owners, especially women, how to take control of their finances and overcome limiting beliefs or energetic blocks around money.
With the launch of my podcast, I’m thrilled to introduce a new coaching program that guides owners through the A to Z of financial management. This includes financial statement foundations, cash and debt management, budgeting and forecasting, financial tools and software, tax strategies, and more. My goal is to empower owners to know their numbers and have a clear roadmap to financial freedom, one step at a time.
I’m passionate about sharing the “boring” finance concepts I learned in school in a fun and creative way, so that even non-math enthusiasts can take control of their financial future and find freedom through their business. I’m excited to help others unlock their potential and achieve the success they deserve.
How’d you meet your business partner?
My husband has been my business partner in our real estate ventures from the very beginning. While we were dating, we discovered our shared ambition to achieve financial freedom at a young age. This common goal led us to dive into learning about real estate investment together. As we’ve expanded into other businesses, we’ve continued to support each other by leveraging our individual strengths. I handle the finances across all our ventures, thanks to my knack for numbers, while he manages the software and technology, which is his forte.
Working with my spouse hasn’t always been easy; it took us a few years to figure out the best way to collaborate effectively. As we’ve grown, we’ve pursued individual business endeavors but continue to cheer each other on and support one another in our respective zones of genius. The beauty of working together is that our incentives are perfectly aligned—when one of us succeeds, our entire family benefits. He is the best business partner I could ask for, and having someone in my corner who cares about my interests as much as his own is invaluable!
Can you open up about how you funded your business?
When we embarked on our real estate journey, we didn’t have much capital to leverage for purchasing rental properties. We managed to borrow about $25,000 from our retirement accounts, but that was quickly exhausted. We decided to employ a real estate strategy known as BRRRR (Buy, Rehab, Rent, Refinance, Repeat) or “flip to rent.” This involved buying a rundown home, fixing it up, and instead of selling it like a traditional flip, renting it out and refinancing. The aim was to pay off the initial loans used for purchase and refinance the property, resulting in a cash-flowing asset with no capital invested. Our second deal was a tremendous success, allowing us to pull out about $50,000 in cash beyond our investment. This windfall enabled us to purchase three additional rentals the following year, propelling us toward financial freedom.
When I decided to launch my CFO business, I knew I needed capital to cover salaries and expenses like software and advertising. Without the cash on hand, I opted for a personal loan to fund six months of operations. Although it came with a high interest rate, it provided the runway needed to grow my client list. I’m also a big advocate of using credit cards with introductory 0% interest rates, which provide a year of interest-free “loans” to support working capital. With our real estate portfolio serving as a safety net, I felt confident in taking the risk of borrowing to fund my business. This strategic approach has been instrumental in launching and growing my businesses, and I’m incredibly grateful for the position it has put me in today.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://EnergeticCFO.com
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tiffany-vogel-cfo
- Other: https://calendly.com/tiffanyv-cfo/call
