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Welcome to Financial Freestyle. I'm Ross Mack, and this is sponsored by Vanguard.

So you want your money working as hard as they possibly can to grow and build as hard as you work to earn that paycheck.You want money working for you while you sleep, because unless you've got, you know, hundreds of thousands of dollars working for you while you sleep, you're not going to be able to retire comfortably and stop trading time for money.

Welcome to Financial Freestyle here on Yahoo Finance, and I'm your host, Ross Mack. Now look, no matter where you are on your financial journey, every success begins with a single step, and guys, you've landed at the right spot. In this series, I'm sitting down with some of the most influential minds in finance to explore their paths to economic success. And today is no different. I'm chatting with an entrepreneur, podcaster, and personal finance content creator.Austin Hankins, my dog Austin. Thanks so much for joining the show, brother. How you been,

man? I'm good. Really good. Spent the week here in New York City. 2025 has been off to a hot start. The Rich Habits podcast is just charting like crazy, a bunch of new listeners, and there's a lot to look forward to.

Well, there you have it. I was literally getting ready. You kind of went in, but I was about to say to the audience, who is Austin?

So I'm Austin Hanwitz. I'm 28 years old. I live in Nashville, Tennessee. I got my degree in finance and economics back in 2018 from the University of Tennessee. I did mergers and acquisitions for a couple of years out of college and then in March of 2020, I was inspired to start posting personal finance and investing videos on TikTok. Now, again, I was like 24 years old at the time, so I was more not the financial guru, but instead likeHey, I'm going to go try some stuff. I'm going to go figure some stuff out and if I learn something, I'm going to post about it so you don't make the same mistake I'd made, right? So I'm talking about the Roth IRA. I'm talking about investing, buying my first house, growing my credit score, stuff like that, and people really liked it. So it all started with personal finance and investing content on TikTok. I started a newsletter after that, a couple podcasts, and here we are in yours.

Ilove it because we actually talked about this for one, right? Let's bag it up.Austin's my guy. We actually met we met a few years ago at the New York Stock Exchange. So ever since then, we've obviously stayed in contact with one another. And even crazy, we bumped into each other on vacation, which was random. We were both in Mexico at the same resort. Like, what? Austin, what's up, bro? That was so funny. But another thing I learned was the fact that you actually posted your first TikTok post in 2020, but on March 17th, which is my son's birthday. So likeObviously, a typical college grad is probably looking to start a job, so you did M&A, but like how did life change for you after that firstpost?

Life changed a lot. UmYou know, I'd say after that first post, the first thing I really began to realize is that people need a helping hand when it comes to personal finance and investing, and unfortunately, and maybe fortunately, but in my opinion, unfortunately, a lot of those helping hands right now are the boring, tired old guys with glasses and gray hair on talk show radio, right? That might have some crazy views.And we're not going to say their name, but that's kind of where they're at. Um, and so I think a lot of people need that younger, more relatable, hey, OK, wait a second, I'm in college or I just graduated, I'm in my early 30s, like this guy's also kind of going through stuff and I'm going through like, what can I provide as sort of that, you know, peer to peer relationship. But man, everything changed after that. I met my co-founder Christian Blackwell.Well, I was able to obviously meet a lot of incredible people like yourself. I started a couple podcasts. I started a couple of newsletters. My rate of return newsletter recently got acquired by a large financial media company last year, and we've just been able to help so many people as it relates to just starting and continuing their wealth building journeys and retiring with dignity, setting themselves up for financial success.

Soone, right, you're 28 years old, right, like.Sounds so accomplished at a very old age of 28. So one, I just want to tip my hat and commend you. But another thing you got to ask yourself is like, how do you cut through the fluff, right? When you get on TikTok, when you get on Instagram, YouTube, etc. there's so many people that try to get, especially in 2020, right? Everybody's at home, the world is shut down, COVID this, that. So many people try to you know take their hand as a financial guru, yada yada.How did you find a way to cut through the fluff and actually have staying power and more importantly, inspire millions?

Two words authenticity and transparency. I love it. I have been the biggest believer in transparency with my content and everything that I do since day one, and by that I literally mean, hi, my name's Austin, here's how much is in my portfolio, or here's what I'm up or down today on this, or you know, here's what my credit score is and here the clear.You know, action items I'm taking to grow it to this, you know, 800, 830, whatever, right? Um, and so I think just being authentic and transparent with everything I do has allowed people to say, OK, wait a second, he might not just be a guy trying to sell me a course on something like everyone else's on TikTok and Instagram. He may just be trying to help me out and um, you know, help me continue my wealth building journey.

You know, I love what you say, like, everybody's trying to sell this or sell that, right? And I was speaking to another person a couple of weeks ago and it's likeWhen it comes to this, has this person actually helped me make money for free? And I find that to be very inspiring. So clearly you're being transparent, you're saying one which you own, as well as in your newsletter. So let's actually talk about how you have found a way, right? Just starting out at TikTok.How did you find ways to make multiple streams with man?

Yeah, totally. So the first thing I realized, it's like flip to the entrepreneur side of the equation, right? First thing I realized was I need to own my audience. So I can't be, you know.Reliant on the marketing budgets of different companies and cross my fingers for a brand deal or something because I think when content creators and influencers are relying on those things and oh my gosh, rent is due or my mortgage is coming up, they get a little desperate and they might take a brand deal with a company they might not align with and that's not very authentic and so it's just a terrible spiral there. So what I realized is if I wanted toReally have the staying power as an entrepreneur, I needed to own my audience and monetize my audience directly. And so that included, hey guys, I'll start doing some live streams. I'll start a newsletter and you know maybe once per week or twice per week I'll I'll publish some exclusive analysis of something and it's gonna be behind a paywall, but IBe providing such more, so much more value than I'd argue the, you know, in the beginning it was $9 a month, right, for some of these like live stream access and I was a really big believer that I don't think people should have to choose between like their, their Netflix subscription or subscribing to my newsletter or watching my live streams or something like that.And soover the years is to entertain others.

That's true. You head to head with uh with Netflix, take that,

um, but you know, with that being said, to diversifying the business now. So right, I'd started in 2020. I'd argue we really sort of peaked this meme stock era with GameStop and Robin Hood in early 21 by call it early 20.2, we were really beginning to see a pullback in the markets, a pullback in the economy, and this was when I was like, OK, I really should diversify my business away from just, you know, social media content online. And my co-founder Christian and I realized that over the last two years or so, we got really good at social media marketing specifically for fintech companies. So, you know, think.Public or wealth front or fundrise and betterment, these like really massive billion dollar companies who have wonderful products, they just don't know how to get those products in front of the right people. And so we started working with them on a consulting basis and we were able to, you know, again diversify our revenue streams of our business away from just paid posts on social media to, well, maybe I can help some of these corporate clients with their marketing ideas. And then since then too.We've launched a couple podcasts along the way, figured out different ways to monetize those, but over the years, it's been a really interesting way to just build a creator business from scratch that's not so reliant on this, you know, I got to have a brand deal with one person and cross my fingers that it's a good one.

You know, I, I, I, I find that to be fascinating because what people don't realize is that one, when you're relying on someone else's budget, it's extremely hard. So one, my my best saying is that, you know, having one stream of income is too close to zero, but I think it's important as a content creator.And if you're like, you're relying on brand deals, it's like, no, actually, oh, budget cuts are this, that and a third, and you might not be written into that budget, but I love the idea of you saying I had to own my audience. Guys, we got to take a quick break, but when we come back, we'll have more with Austin Hankowitz, co-host of Rich Habits.All right guys, welcome back to Financial Freestyle, and we're back with my guy Austin Hankowitz, co-founder of Wits Ventures and co-host of Rich Habits podcast. Let's actually talk about, you know, your podcast, right? SoWhat is your podcast? Obviously you're charting. How did it come about? Where's it at now? Let's talk about

it. Yeah, man. So I co-host the Rich Habits podcast alongside Robert Croak. Robert Croak, funny enough, is the creator of Silly bands. I don't know if you guys remember those little bracelets from back in the late 2008, 2010 range, I think is when they really got popular. Um, but how it came about was he started making videos about personal finance and investing on TikTok.As well, but the videos that he was making came from the perspective of someone who's in their late 50s and has built, you know, multi $100 million businesses and has all these properties, all these really cool things. And I was like, man, like one, I want to learn from this guy. But two, I feel like some of the stuff he's saying should be shared via podcast style and it can either be like a little interview vibe, it could be kind of, you know, something of the likes and we ended up aligning on this idea whereRobert, you know, he's 58. I'm 28, so he's this guy that's got it all figured out and he's done it. I'm the guy still trying to figure it out, still trying to build some wealth. And uh yeah, the Rich Habits podcast. Now I've got a 250 million subscribers on Spotify, um, inching close to 100,000 weekly listeners over there, and we have helped countless people build wealth as it relates to investing for.First time getting out of high interest debt, buying their first rental property, starting their first business, exploring the idea of a side hustle. Um, completely agree with your notion of having one income stream is too close to zero. So this podcast has definitely helped people do that. I'm just super grateful to have the opportunity to speak to so many people every single week.

And so if you are talking to someone that you know might be living paycheck to paycheck, kind of what advice are you giving them when it comes to finding some alternative?Stream of income.

Well, I think the first thing to realize is like this victor versus victim mentality, right, mindset. So Robert and I, every single episode we describe it as business, finance and mindset because mindset and behavior, I'd argue, is the majority of, you know, the predictor of your financial outcome as a person. And so having this victor versus victim mentality allows someone to say, wait a second.It's not weird to have a side hustle. It's not, you know, I'm not broke or something because I want to have a separate stream of income or start the side hustle. So I think like that's like the first mindset shift that everyone needs to make. And then, man, and pieces of advice are crazy. Not only are there unbelievable amount of apps out there that you could drive for Uber or whatever, you know, all that stuff, but like on the flip side now, we have artificial intelligence and so there's a an Instagram account that inspired me.To learn more about this sort of idea of building automations for small boring businesses. So for example, you can use AI right now and this is the I swear the side hustle I tell everyone to do and I've yet to see anyone actually crush it like this one person has, but you can build these automations where let's say for example, you had a restaurant called Ross Ross Max Restaurant, OK? And uh you would have like a QR code. Someone could scan the QR code and they'd put in their email address and their phone number and you could build an automation.Around maybe the slow hours before happy hour, you'd send out a text message, say, Hey, we're on this special 50% off whatever, like come hang out at the restaurant, or maybe they're added to an email drip campaign um getting them excited about Valentine's Day that just passed, or maybe excited about birthday specials or like all these automations that you can use AI, Zapier, all these other cool, you know, sort of technology stacks to automate communication, revenue streams, and everything in between. I know it might sound a little bit complicated, but AI can unlock.So much for people who really want to start that side hustle in 2025 and we've just been pounding the table on this one with automations, man, because these people who are in their 40s, 50s, and 60s that might own the restaurants or the dentist business or the barbershops, they don't know how to use this stuff. They're looking at us to say, Hey, here's what I built. Give me $500 a month and I'll maintain it foryou.

Wow. I love that. Plus actually talk about maybe some of these success stories and some of the game you're giving, what should you be invested in and how should you approach that for that average investor?

Absolutely.So I'm a big believer in American capitalism. I believe that earnings will continue to rise. I think that people will continue to innovate and create new products and services that benefit the masses, and in return they will obviously make more profits. The market caps of their companies will rise, things of that nature. And so what should people invest and they should invest in America. And the easiest way in my opinion to do that is with the S&P 500, right? These are the 5.largest and most profitable companies operating inside the United States. We all heard of like the big tech, you know, it's Tesla, it's Microsoft, it's Amazon, it's Google, but I mean, those are just 7 of the names of the other, you know, we have 493 others, right? So, you know, the S&P is not just investing into like the big tech. So that's that's first and foremost. After you've built your base, so after you've got, you know, $5000 to $100,000 invested in these tried and true index funds like the S&P 500, the Dow Jones.Industrial Average, the NASDAQ 100, these awesome index funds and ETFs that will continue to grow over time. Then we talk about, well, hey, how can we diversify a little bit? Maybe, you know, there's nothing wrong with owning a little bit of gold. Gold's up some like 30 or 40% in the last I'd call it, you know, year to year and a half. Nothing wrong with owning some real estate. Maybe you want to buy some REITs real estate investment trusts, add that to your portfolio. Uh, maybe you want some cryptocurrency. I think that's so cool to have some Bitcoin. I own some Bitcoin. I say 5 to 15%.Uh, of your total portfolio should be invested into sort of these like diversified, you know, ways to uh to earn more money while also weathering a potential storm. And so when it comes to investing and what to buy, it's as simple as that. A lot of people make the mistake of, you know, oh, some guy on the internet, uh, told me I should go buy this crazy stock. He says it's going to go to 100% and it's at 4 cents right now. I'm gonna become a billionaire, man.I've made those mistakes. I've bought the penny stocks. I've lost the money and I've realized like that's not investing, that's gambling. I'm an investor. I don't like to gamble, and I'd encourage everyone to have that same mentality in 2025. Well,

let's actually talk about another mistake you've mentioned in the past that you've made, and that isRight? Not taking profits along the way. Oh yeah. Let's actually expand on that, right? For our audience, how would you actually characterize that and break that down?

So let's define what that means, right? Um, let's say I invested $10,000 into a stock, um, and let's say that stock over the last 6 months is up 100%. Let's say it was like Nvidia, did something crazy, right?I'm not saying that people should sell their winners. I think Warren Buffett is famous for, you know, saying you should hold on to your winners and let them ride, butI'm not Warren Buffett. I'd argue that no one else listening is either, so I think it's very prudent and responsible to, as these positions continue to go up and up and up in value, to begin to take some money off the top, realize those profits, and rediversify it somewhere else into your portfolio. So you're not saying I'm going to sell my Apple stock or my Tesla stock and go.Blow it off on something that's a depreciating asset. I'm saying as your Tesla stock or whatever you have continues to rise in value, you begin to take that money and maybe you want to keep it in this EV sector. So maybe you buy some other EV things or you want to just diversify it back into the S&P 500, but a good rule of thumb, and I'm not going to take credit, Robert came up with this rule of thumb, every 50%.That that that position goes up in profit, take 25% of the total value of that position out, and then you can reinvest that somewhere else. And so it goes up another 50%, so you're up 100%, they're gonna take another 25% out. And so you can kind of follow this rule and say, OK, this is a really easy way for me to now have a strategy where I can take a motion because I mean, dude, when a stock.is up 100% or 200 or 300, 400%. There's a lot of emotion in that. You feel crazy, you feel euphoric, you feel like this is an amazing thing. Having a rules-based strategy around profit taking will allow you to keep the emotion on the side and be a prudent, just strategic investor. I

love it. So then tell me, what are your rules when it comes to what's the next stock that I might potentially buy, right? Do you have a kind of a tried and true rule when it comes to what makes a stock a good investment?

Yes and no. I look for a handful of things. The first thing I'm looking for is the company operating in what I call a secular growth trend, right? So I'd argue a good example of this is cybersecurity. Cybersecurity for the last 5 years and for the next 5 and 10 years, especially with the rise of AI, has just been going up and to the right like crazy. I think it was the Wall Street Journal that reported a couple weeks ago thatChief information technology officers at Fortune 1000 companies plan to spend like 20% more this year on cybersecurity than they did the year before. So like I want to be investing into a company who's operating within one of these secular growth trends because that just means revenues will naturally drift higher.So rule number 1, secular growth trend. Rule number 2, I always look at the market cap of the company, which is like the price tag, what it's worth, because I don't want to be investing in these penny stocks. I don't want to be investing in these micro cap names. I want to be investing in companies with market caps, let's call it at least 10. I prefer $50 billion or above because they're likely at that point haveHundreds of millions of revenue. They're probably profitable, things of that nature. And the last thing I'm looking at is cash flow. I'm a big believer that cash is king, and when it comes to valuing a company and figuring out is a company's value going to increase or decrease in the future, well, how much cash is it going to add to its bank account, right? How much cash will it will it be able to pay to its shareholders via dividends and things like that. So free cash flow is definitely top of mind for me.

Allright, for the interest of time, I want to continue to pick your brand. We could sit here and talk shop all day, butSo a person that's listening, right?Say they did get that 1st 50 to 100. They built that base. What should their portfolio look like? And we'll say it this way, right? Because I hate asking a broad question like that. They have a high risk tolerance. They're 30 years old.What what should that portfolio look like? And give me some of your names if that's OK.

Yeah, totally. So I would argue thatThe most important thing when it comes to portfolio construction first and foremost is the account it's in, right? We want to make sure we got the Roth IRA. We want to make sure that we're doing the 401k. We want to make sure like we're investing via the correct vehicles. So assuming it's all, you know, invested correctly, let's now think about how the actual portfolio is constructed. I like to personally follow what I call a core satellite portfolio strategy, which essentially meansThink about the Earth, right? We have the Earth and you have like the moon a little satellites, right, that that orbit the Earth. The vast majority of someone's portfolio, which in actual like technical terms here, let's talk technical, um, 65 to 80% of someone's portfolio, in my humble opinion, should be invested and tried and true.Blue chip, single stocks, index funds, ETFs, I'm talking VOO VGT VTI MOAT, um, you know, we're thinking about VUG if you want some growth, if you want some like blue chip single stocks, I love Tesla. I love Amazon, I love Google, Microsoft Math, but like, I'm talking about 65 to 80% of someone's portfolio should be in those because those are going to be here forever, right? I don't want, I don't want my future to be dictated upon a single stock who if they miss.Earnings I lose 150, right? I want, I want, I want the vast majority of my wealth to be invested into good things. Now that's the core side. The satellite side is the other 20 to 35%. Those to me are the like Ubers of the world, the crowd strikes, the Palo Alto Networks, the hymns and hers. That was my first 10X stock pick I posted to Seeking Alpha back in December 2022 and it was at $6 a share. It crossed $70 earlier this week, right? So it's likeThose are those names we want to be a little bit more risky, a little bit more uh high octane, throw those in there, but don't let them become more than about a 3 to 4% actual waiting in your entire portfolio for that single name. So that's the portfolio construction, that's the breakdown. That's how, that's how I invest. That's why I think other people should invest in.Back to this idea of like transparency and authenticity, right? It's like, you've got to talk about this stuff because you're not going to hear this on talk radio, you're not going to hear these like specific breakdowns and names and ideas on, you know, all these other podcasts. I think that's what makes us so valuable and your show as well. It's like we get into the nitty gritty, and we tell people exactly what we think our opinions are and um that's, that's, that's it.

I love it. I love it. Guys, that's it for this episode of Financial Freestyle, and I really want to give a shout out to my dog, Austin Hankowitz, for sharing this story, man, and actually engaging and more importantly, inspiring us, right? I hope this did something for you on your own financial journey. And as always guys, be sure to tune in next week for a brand new episode of Financial Freestyle here on Yahoo

Finance. This content was not intended to be financial advice and should not be used as a substitute for professional financial services.