In a new episode of the Financial Planning Podcast, Lindsey Swanson discusses how her passion for serving clients often discriminated against took her from managing money for members of the cannabis industry to helping sex workers achieve all of their financial goals.
Swanson, founder of
The fee-only CFP now provides financial advice to strippers, prostitutes, porn stars, sugar babies, escorts and more via Stripper Financial Planning. She chose the name to let potential clients know her practice would welcome them with open arms, no matter how they choose to pay the bills.
With millions of people already doing sex work and sites like OnlyFans ushering new adult content creators into the industry each day, Swanson believes a great business opportunity exists for any advisor willing to look past the stigmas and dive in. More importantly, she knows a group of people often alienated for making an honest, albeit unconventional, living are getting the help they need to reach their full financial potential.
During her conversation with FP Podcast host and lead editorial producer
Listen to the new episode — as well as all future and past episodes — by subscribing to the FP Podcast on
Transcription:
00;00;02;27 - 00;00;19;26
Justin L. Mack
Good morning. Good afternoon and good evening. Welcome to the Financial Planning Podcast. I'm your host, Justin L. Mack, reporter, with Financial Planning and it is my absolute pleasure to welcome today's guest, Lindsey Swanson, founder of Stripper Financial Planning. Lindsey, thanks so much for taking the time to hang out today.
00;00;20;07 - 00;00;22;21
Lindsey Swanson
Hey, Justin. Great to be here. Thanks for having me on the show.
00;00;23;01 - 00;00;48;18
Justin L. Mack
Absolutely. Now, Lindsey is a CFP who has been helping clients reach their financial goals for the better part of a decade. And she started her journey on which you may consider the traditional path working as an investment analyst and a financial advisor at traditional financial services firms. But a couple of years ago, she decided to forge her own path, launching a virtual only practice to serve clients who were being discriminated against and found themselves unable to get the sound financial advice they needed.
00;00;48;28 - 00;01;05;11
Justin L. Mack
Now, many of those clients were raking in cash in the cannabis industry, and that line of work led her to what she does today. Add stripper financial planning, which is helping sex workers achieve all of their financial goals. Lindsay's also really comfortable with this format, as she has her own podcast called A Scoop of Vanilla. Be sure to go check that out.
00;01;05;19 - 00;01;23;19
Justin L. Mack
Now, Lindsay, let's just dove right in and address what might be for some folks an elephant in the room. The name of your business, stripper financial planning might raise some eyebrows for folks both familiar and unfamiliar with the industry. Explain some of the work you do today and how you got here from what was a very traditional CFP journey.
00;01;24;04 - 00;01;51;17
Lindsey Swanson
Yeah, definitely. Well, you know, the name of my company and my company as a whole is very polarizing. And I get a lot of that. People a lot of people are just uncomfortable with what I'm doing, and I think that's okay. I mean, the sex worker industry as is one of the oldest industries that we have. And so kind of regardless of, you know, the the current culture of how you feel about it, where you think it should be in society, it continues to like pop up in different places.
00;01;51;24 - 00;02;10;05
Lindsey Swanson
And really, what my focus is, is it's going to exist. And so I want the people who are engaged in it to have a safe path. I want them to have civil rights. I want them to be able to work with financial professionals that treat them with kindness and respect. And I didn't see that existing. And in fact, I saw the opposite.
00;02;10;11 - 00;02;30;24
Lindsey Swanson
So even at institutions where sex workers are trying to go and get help, they're facing a lot of different discrimination. I mean, sometimes advisors just straight up won't work with them because they're uncomfortable for religious reasons or moral reasons, or they take on the client and they don't ask the right questions. To help them. They want them to fit into the box of a typical client.
00;02;30;24 - 00;03;07;23
Lindsey Swanson
They don't understand that there are different considerations. So that's an issue of just, you know, not being knowledgeable and not taking the time to lean into what questions they might have and what concerns they have that are out of the ordinary for a typical nine to five employee And the other thing that I was saying, too, which is unfortunate but true, is because it's such an Old-School industry and there are a lot of conservative advisors, a lot of times you know, sex worker clients will work with an adviser and they'll either, you know, harass them or just straight up sexually assault them because there's a misunderstanding that being involved as a sex worker does not mean
00;03;07;23 - 00;03;33;14
Lindsey Swanson
you're consenting to every advance of any person that exists, which is just a misunderstanding of consent in general. But because of that, they're there's a great distrust for banking institutions and for advisors on the whole, which is accurate. They should be distressed. And so for me, I wanted to make sure that I was in some ways like screaming from the rooftops like, this is a safe place, this is how I will treat you.
00;03;33;17 - 00;03;43;07
Lindsey Swanson
These are, you know, the rights that you will have as being my client so that they feel like they can they can come to me safely and have a good engagement.
00;03;43;24 - 00;04;04;06
Justin L. Mack
Absolutely. And how do you work to create that feeling of safety or understanding among your clients? And how much does your presentation have to go with, you know, creating or presenting that message out? At first brush, because if these folks are looking for financial advice and they find you, they might only have a short period of time on Google or something or coming across your name to make that decision.
00;04;04;11 - 00;04;06;22
Justin L. Mack
How do you let them know that, hey, this is the right place for you?
00;04;06;26 - 00;04;23;20
Lindsey Swanson
I mean, I think that's that's the struggle, right? One of the things I'm trying to do with my branding and how I present myself as is be authentic. It helps that I am a lot of my clients are in their twenties and I'm 29. And so I think that I'm seen as more of a safe person because of that, because I seem relatable.
00;04;23;27 - 00;04;43;15
Lindsey Swanson
But it's also in you know, how I built my site, like I wanted to make sure that the branding wasn't. It's not like red velvet and like flashing lights, like it's essentially like pink and like trying to present sex workers as the normal humans. They are, they are, they are humans who have a job and it happens to be sex work until they aren't.
00;04;43;24 - 00;05;02;13
Lindsey Swanson
It's not like it's sexy. 100% of the time, it's, it's, that's, that's their job. And then the rest of the time they have spouses and they have children and they volunteer in their community. And it's you know, trying, trying to present myself is understanding that sex workers aren't just this one sided, sexy person only.
00;05;02;25 - 00;05;11;11
Justin L. Mack
Absolutely. And let's talk a little bit about that client base. What constitutes sex work or how wide is that scope and what kind of professions are you working with?
00;05;12;16 - 00;05;35;11
Lindsey Swanson
So I would say that it's very difficult to describe what sex work is because it's kind of an open definition for me with my clients. My determination is basically to be a client and to work with me. You have to be operating legally in your local area and you have to be accurately reporting your taxes. And I say it that way because there are areas where full service sex workers.
00;05;35;11 - 00;05;57;27
Lindsey Swanson
So in terms that we would understand, like prostitution is illegal, there are some counties in Nevada. And so for those clients, I can work with them in my area. Full service sex work isn't legal, so I couldn't work with clients here that are doing those activities, but I personally don't have a problem with legally I can't because of the regulations, but personally I don't have a problem with it.
00;05;57;27 - 00;06;25;25
Lindsey Swanson
So I still am providing free materials in terms of resources on my site for that community as well. And the sex worker community, it includes a lot of different things. You know, it includes strippers, that's part of my name, but also escorts sugar babies, people who create porn models and actresses and like cam girls and people on OnlyFans, like there's a lot of there's a lot of different nations that that covers.
00;06;26;05 - 00;06;44;20
Lindsey Swanson
And it's funny because people will tell me like, don't you think that sex work is like too specific of a niche? Like don't you think that it would be better just to, like, work with women in their twenties or something? And I'm like, honestly, there's millions of people that are doing sex work. Like, I, I just don't have the capacity to even work with a small percentage of them.
00;06;44;20 - 00;06;48;15
Lindsey Swanson
So it's like almost too broad of a term to even just work with sex workers.
00;06;49;04 - 00;07;11;29
Justin L. Mack
And that was going to be another question I had to about growth and kind of the, the potential in that client base because, you know, OnlyFans wasn't what it was five years ago or patron wasn't what it was five years ago when you were starting to journey. And now at any given moment there could be, like you said, thousands, millions of people entering this line of work just by create an account and logging on to their computer.
00;07;11;29 - 00;07;32;20
Justin L. Mack
So I think you make a good point about the ability or the need that might exist because of how many people are getting into this without maybe thinking about the complexities of their finances. Talk a little bit about that because I think and I've when we talked before, you kind of mentioned the parallel between sex workers and athletes as far as earning potential and kind of the similar struggles.
00;07;32;20 - 00;07;38;17
Justin L. Mack
What are some of the complexities of struggles with someone who is maybe making a lot of money in their prime as a sex worker?
00;07;39;11 - 00;07;58;22
Lindsey Swanson
I mean, I think that it's similar to athletes like we talked about or, you know, a lot of self-employed individuals or people that work on contract have a period of time in their life where their their earning potential is higher. We see that a lot with athletes. And so it's understanding how long, how long is this journey for them?
00;07;58;29 - 00;08;16;25
Lindsey Swanson
I mean, you look at someone like LeBron and it's like, oh, he's been able to stretch it out for a long period of time. And because of that, there's a lot of branding that goes along with it. So he could retire at any point and not have it impact him in as long as he's like realistically saving and understanding his finances.
00;08;16;26 - 00;08;36;20
Lindsey Swanson
And so I see that with clients a lot and it just depends on the person how long they want to stay in it or if they want to transition to using their brand to become a life coach or to consult with other people about sex, work So a lot of what we talk about with our clients is just are you leaning into it right now?
00;08;36;20 - 00;08;51;09
Lindsey Swanson
Are you transitioning out? Like what does growth look like? For you? Are you doing this for a means to an end or are you doing it because you love it and you want to see how many different opportunities you have in this space? But kind of to your point of like, you know, how many sex workers are out there?
00;08;51;09 - 00;09;26;10
Lindsey Swanson
Like a lot of people do sex work part time or for a period of their lives and then transition to something else. And we just as a society, don't know who those people are because they don't feel safe in sharing that. And because I've been so open in my marketing, I have a lot of people that reach out to me that aren't publicly sharing that they have done sex work, but who are, you know, other couples and other attorneys and CPAs that are like hey, I just wanted to tell you, like, really only like three or four people know, but I did sex work and I just really appreciate what you're doing.
00;09;26;20 - 00;09;46;17
Lindsey Swanson
And I've never felt like it was safe for me to share that part of my life with other people. But I think that it should be. And so, like, go you. And that's been really empowering to me because, you know, I think that it's hard to have to hide parts of your life and that that people should be able to own that and not be worried about it negatively impacting their career.
00;09;47;04 - 00;09;59;15
Justin L. Mack
No, absolutely. Now, you are listening to the Financial Planning Podcast. We are talking to our guest, Lindsey Swanson, founder of Stripper Financial Planning. We're going to take a quick break and hear a word from our sponsors. We'll be right back.
00;10;02;19 - 00;10;38;02
Justin L. Mack
And we are back on the Financial Planning Podcast with our guest today, Lindsey Swanson, founder of Stripper Financial Planning. Now, Lindsey, you talked a little bit about some of the discrimination and the hardships your clients face just because of the line of work they are in. But tell me a little bit about maybe some of the obstacles that you were presented with when you made this career change, going from the traditional CFP path, being an advisor and an analyst and deciding to not only go into this line of work, but as you mentioned earlier, kind of being very, very vocal about it and presenting yourself in a way that doesn't necessarily jive with the traditional presentation
00;10;38;02 - 00;10;44;11
Justin L. Mack
of an idea or an independent advisor What was that like for you when you made that switch and how were you treated at times?
00;10;44;23 - 00;11;04;19
Lindsey Swanson
Yeah, I mean, I think it's I think it's tricky. I've had to even over the course of just starting my firm really disconnect a lot of my self-worth from what other people feel about me. And I've always been a people person and a people pleaser and so when I first started, I really I wanted to make sure that I had everyone's okay.
00;11;04;19 - 00;11;23;08
Lindsey Swanson
I wanted to make sure I had everyone's blessing. And what I realized is that the CFP and the wealth management industry is very much set up for a particular model. It's the model we work with, you know, 40 to 60 somethings that are in retirement age. And we know how it works and it tends to always look the same.
00;11;23;08 - 00;11;40;09
Lindsey Swanson
And if you try to go outside of that, not only do people not understand it, but they really make you question if you can do it and if you're capable. And that was really hard for me. I especially for the first few months, I was like really doubting if I could do it just because I wasn't getting the approval of literally everybody.
00;11;41;12 - 00;12;04;25
Lindsey Swanson
And I had to step back and be like, you know, I trust my gut on this. I there is a problem. I think I can solve it. And I'm going to just do my best. And if that doesn't work, then I'm okay with that. And, you know, I'm young enough to just be able to try something else. But I really had to disengage from a lot of the negative energy around me, and especially in the industry of just saying like, you know, this isn't proven.
00;12;04;25 - 00;12;29;01
Lindsey Swanson
And, you know, like there's a lot of conversations about AEW and being sticky in that. You get clients and you have a block of clients. And then later if you want to retire, you can sell that book of clients. And that's not how my business runs at all. And so even just in terms of like running a different type of business, a subscription model and not doing being invited only and not doing a home is people just don't understand it.
00;12;29;01 - 00;12;52;08
Lindsey Swanson
And they like straight up, just like, don't believe in me. And that's hard. I it's hard as a young person. It's hard as a woman and it's hard even disconnected from the wealth management industry because what we do is so niche that the general public usually doesn't really understand it. So what's that? What that has really meant is just that most people don't understand what I'm doing and I've had to be okay with that.
00;12;52;21 - 00;13;12;21
Lindsey Swanson
And then, you know, there's all of the polarizing things of of working with sex workers and how people feel about it. And I have you know, I have lost opportunities because of that. I have people who now won't respond to my emails and family members who are upset with me. And it's one of those things that I really think that I'm doing the right thing and not like a man magic, you know, white savior.
00;13;12;21 - 00;13;30;19
Lindsey Swanson
But I think I think that this is the right path. I think no one else is doing it. And so I'm willing to do it. And hopefully people come behind me and are doing it way better. And then I can be like, oh, thank God. We, like some other people are like, I just started it. And then other people can rush by and be more impressive.
00;13;30;19 - 00;13;31;29
Lindsey Swanson
And then I'll be really happy with that.
00;13;32;11 - 00;13;48;20
Justin L. Mack
Definitely. And it's probably a little bit too early to tell because like you mentioned, this is still something that I imagine you would consider in the early stages, you know, making this change and in the first couple of years. But if you were to ask yourself the question now, am I successful at this? Is this working? Would you say that you found that and what keeps you going?
00;13;48;20 - 00;13;59;13
Justin L. Mack
Like you mentioned all those times where you question yourself and then you realize what you've lost as far as maybe some relationships or some support. What keeps you going? And do you feel like you've achieved success with this change?
00;14;00;08 - 00;14;24;21
Lindsey Swanson
You know, I, I do feel like I've achieved success. I was very careful to be intentional about what success would look like for me and the ability to do something that I'm passionate about, the ability to help people that are underserved, that that need help to be able to do it on my own terms and control. That is something that's really important to me, something I haven't had in my career before.
00;14;25;07 - 00;14;43;27
Lindsey Swanson
And honestly, it's despite being like hard. It's really fun. Like, I love to be able to create something and put it out in the universe and see if it's helpful. And then, like when it gets torn to shreds, like, it just didn't make it better and I think that that's a really special opportunity that we have as solo advisors and it's something that I'm looking to do.
00;14;44;08 - 00;14;59;13
Justin L. Mack
Definitely not your fee. Only, as you mentioned, 350 bucks a month if I've got that right. That's correct. Why that fee structure and how does that help your clients and why not do something traditional as far as, you know, something billable or taking your percentage? Why the fee only structure?
00;15;00;10 - 00;15;32;03
Lindsey Swanson
Yeah, I mean a lot of different reasons, but I think that an A-1 based company at its very structure makes it a necessity to work with a certain, I guess I'll say, like class of clients that have wealth. It's usually generational wealth. I mean, there's very few. I really want to serve people who are younger, and there's very few 20 somethings that have that level of wealth, unless either they were in tech, you know, they happened to be incredibly successful or they inherited their wealth.
00;15;32;18 - 00;15;57;18
Lindsey Swanson
And those people exist and are definitely being served but for, I guess I'll say, like more of the normal people who are just like making good money but who have debt and have other concerns and want to buy a house. Like there isn't the E1 model doesn't really serve them, there's not a place for them. And so I wanted to try to understand whether what other options were out there to allow me to make a profit and have a solvent company but to to fit my client's needs.
00;15;58;08 - 00;16;27;09
Lindsey Swanson
And that's how I kind of decided on the subscription model. And I do have a flat fee. So it's three 50 for anyone, regardless of, you know, what they make or what they have in assets. And the reason I did that is because I've worked at so many firms where it was like, you know, they had a let's say they had $1,000,000 minimum and then the people who are right at that minimum barely get any service because people are like it's you know, you care about the client base on like how much weight they have in paying your bills.
00;16;27;09 - 00;16;56;07
Lindsey Swanson
And so you have a client that has $50 million and you're spending the majority of your time talking to them. And then sometimes you're like, Oh, I guess I haven't talked to that client in a year. Weird. And that's pretty, you know, normal for firms. And it just kind of naturally happens. And so I wanted to have a little more equality between clients, but also not feel like if a client leaves me or if I think a client is in a good fit, I want to be able to end that relationship without worrying that it's going to bankrupt my company.
00;16;56;22 - 00;17;12;24
Justin L. Mack
Absolutely. And I guess what were some of the biggest surprises once you've actually started doing this on a regular basis after making that switch stuff that stands out either either as big positives or something extremely rewarding from being in this line of work compared to what you were doing before that?
00;17;12;27 - 00;17;30;20
Lindsey Swanson
I mean, there's a lot of things I could say and about, but I think one of the most surprising things is my clients are so nice. They're just so nice. You know, I've worked with a lot of different clients at previous firms, and when I started my firm and people were like, be careful of creepy people. And I was like, okay.
00;17;31;01 - 00;17;56;01
Lindsey Swanson
But the respect that I get from my clients in comparison to the interactions I had with previous bosses or clients is just it's startling I mean, I at previous firms, I definitely was harassed and discriminated against primarily because I was a young woman. And it was something that I was just kind of told to be cool with and put your head down and deal with it.
00;17;56;01 - 00;18;12;12
Lindsey Swanson
And it was really hard for me was something that I always had to fight against. I didn't look the right way. I didn't act the right way. I was you know, their grandchild's age and they couldn't take me seriously and kind of although that is just not magically but magically been lifted when I'm working with people my age and it's it's really nice.
00;18;12;12 - 00;18;20;27
Lindsey Swanson
Like, I don't think everything has to be hard. And it's just it's been a relief to not have to like constantly prove myself to people because they're three times my age.
00;18;21;17 - 00;18;32;04
Justin L. Mack
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, working with money is tough enough. You shouldn't have to go in every conversation with a client dreading. All right, I got to deal with this person or that person. So it sounds like it's been good for the soul in a sense, would you say?
00;18;32;19 - 00;18;55;27
Lindsey Swanson
Yeah. Yeah, definitely. And I think just like kind of freedom of expression. I mean, I'm wearing a t shirt right now, but when I first got this seems silly but when I first got into that industry, I was in like my sundress phase, and I put this on record. The wealth management industry killed my son dress days because I no longer was able to be like pretty and cute in the workplace.
00;18;55;27 - 00;19;12;10
Lindsey Swanson
People were too mean about it and like not respectful to me. So I had to start dressing, like, really conservative and like on, on the side of just like wearing ugly things. And now I'm like, I can wear whatever I want to. This is lovely.
00;19;13;27 - 00;19;32;04
Justin L. Mack
Yeah. Revival of the sun. Just days. I'm gonna go for it. All right. And then, come on. The last thing I'd love to discuss with you is, is kind of a larger conversation. Something that we cover a lot of financial planning and something we want to keep our eye on throughout the industry is the push for greater diversity and representation in the financial services industry.
00;19;32;10 - 00;19;56;06
Justin L. Mack
As I'm sure you're aware, the numbers are low for anything that's not the traditional, older, whiter clientele or employee in the industry. You know, the number of cops that are of color and women are still far lower, especially when you look in the leadership positions. And then I see the work that you're doing and how you are definitely working with underrepresented clients in the truest sense of the form.
00;19;56;16 - 00;20;17;16
Justin L. Mack
What are your thoughts on on the movement that is happening in the industry now? Because right now I feel like the awareness is higher. People are more able to talk about the fact that some things aren't right and some things are lagging behind. Do you feel any of that change and how much work do you think we have left to do before everyone can actually feel like they belong in the financial services industry?
00;20;17;28 - 00;20;38;18
Lindsey Swanson
Oh gosh, I think we have so much work to do. That's something that and that honestly, like that whole conversation is one of the reasons why I wanted to work for my own firm is that when you work for other people, so much of your honesty and expression about those issues isn't allowed to be said because of how the firm is centered, if you will.
00;20;38;27 - 00;20;56;27
Lindsey Swanson
And so I really wanted to be obnoxious about it. You know, if I if I see leaders that are marketing the eye and making money off of it, but not following through with it, I wouldn't be able to call them out. And you can't really do that when you work for someone else because they they're responsible for what you say and they really don't want you to just be shooting from the hip.
00;20;57;09 - 00;21;16;12
Lindsey Swanson
But for me, I think it's really important for everyone who cares to be vocal about it and try to understand what we need to change. And like, for me, that's that's meant trying to understand how my firm can be a part of that and I've thought about, you know, when I scale I when I scale my business, if I hire more people, I want to be very intentional about it.
00;21;16;12 - 00;21;40;03
Lindsey Swanson
And one of the issues I see in the industry is we don't see a lot of representation from different minority groups with advisors. We do see quite a bit of representation from the group of people who are trying to become advisors or who are going to school for it. So we see a lot of diversity in individuals who got their bachelor's degree and had their CFP education through that bachelor's degree.
00;21;40;18 - 00;21;57;29
Lindsey Swanson
But what happens is they don't know a safe place to go. And so, you know, they get hired by whatever firm and a lot of times that firm, like straight up, they're like, we wanted to hire, we wanted to do a diversity hire. Like I heard time and time again when I was interviewing like it's great. They are a woman.
00;21;57;29 - 00;22;17;05
Lindsey Swanson
It would be really great if you were like a woman of color or even like a queer woman of color because then we could check all those boxes and I was like, really? Like, Don't say that. Like, no, don't say that. And they want that diversity hire, right? But once you once you get in the door, they they don't want your diversity of opinion.
00;22;17;11 - 00;22;47;07
Lindsey Swanson
They don't want you to act different. They don't want you to feel different about anything. And so it really starts to, like, kill the soul of the young people that are going into these organizations. And they either will allow it to kill them or they will leave and be like, I'm going to go work in tech and make six figures and have a company that actually has an H.R. department and so one of the things I'm trying to do is, is catch those catch those graduates before they get killed by the industry and be like, come work for me for a couple of years.
00;22;47;17 - 00;23;05;16
Lindsey Swanson
Like, get an understanding of who you are as an advisor, gain some confidence and then, you know, go out and kill it, you know, at a different firm or at your own firm. But just like, let me be a safe place for you to land while you're while you're finding yourself, you know, before the rest of the industry ruins you.
00;23;05;16 - 00;23;16;02
Lindsey Swanson
And I know that sounds dramatic, but I think if you talk to young people at firms or people who who don't fit into that traditional box, you know, you'll realize how prevalent that is in the industry.
00;23;16;23 - 00;23;20;21
Justin L. Mack
Absolutely. You hear that wealth management don't let them go to tech. Keep them here. Yes.
00;23;20;21 - 00;23;23;01
Lindsey Swanson
Keep them here. Pay them, pay them what they're worth.
00;23;23;20 - 00;23;35;02
Justin L. Mack
All right. Well, Lindsay, I wanted to thank you again for taking the time to join us here on the Financial Planning Podcast. If folks are listening to one to check you out, where can they find you? What's the best way to get in contact with you?
00;23;35;21 - 00;23;53;28
Lindsey Swanson
Now? So everything's listed on my website as per financial planning. I'm also on Twitter a lot these days. It's a short version, but it's basically stripped, simplified and then I'm also on Instagram. Super financial planning and again on my podcast, a scoop of Vanilla Ice. So you can find me there.
00;23;54;16 - 00;24;16;29
Justin L. Mack
All right. Absolutely. And I want to thank everyone for tuning in to the Financial Planning Podcast. This episode was produced by Arizent with audio production by Kellie Malone. Special thanks again to our guest, Lindsey Swanson, founder of Stripper Financial Planning. Write us, reviews us and subscribe to our content at www.financial-planning.com/subscribe.
00;24;17;06 - 00;24;20;16
Justin L. Mack
From Financial Planning, I'm Justin Mack. Thanks for listening.