Nearly 70% of our country faces financial challenges that prevent them from reaching their full potential.
That’s two out of every three people you encounter each day. People who struggle to pay the rent. People who have to choose between paying a bill and putting food on the table. People who are juggling the challenge of getting an education while also supporting others. They face real barriers and obstacles that set and keep them behind, with no end in sight.
Imagine a society where everyone benefits and everyone is invited to have an equal chance for a prosperous life – a place where all people have the ability to spend more money, save more money, and invest in themselves and their future without barriers. It’s a more robust, resilient economy that flourishes for the long term.
This is Financial Freedom, and it changes everything for the better. For everyone.
A Foolish theory that drives every
part of our work:
Fewer people will live paycheck to paycheck when…
Everyone has equal access to the key drivers of Financial Freedom:
Housing, Education, Work, Health, and Money.
When these drivers work together successfully, they provide maximum benefit to the individual.
Money
Money doesn’t necessarily make the world go around, but to be financially healthy, it’s important to live on a budget, have money in the bank for unexpected expenses, and have access to and manage credit. For people living paycheck to paycheck, education about money and finances is a piece that’s often missing from the Financial Freedom puzzle.
Meet our Money Rule Breakers
José Quiñonez, Mission Asset Fund
Financial Freedom Drivers(s): Money
Innovation
José Quiñonez is the founder and CEO of Mission Asset Fund, which helps low-income and immigrant communities become visible, active, and successful in their financial lives. Through its innovative, award-winning programs, Mission Asset Fund has provided zero-interest loans to people across the country, helping them increase their credit scores, pay down debt, and save for important goals like becoming a homeowner, a business owner, or a U.S. citizen.
Impact
José and his team are changing how we understand the pathways to Financial Freedom and the importance of creating mechanisms that can move a range of new financial activity and expertise into the financial mainstream. Mission Asset Fund has distributed more than 16,000 zero-interest loans to date, and 90% of the people they’ve helped have been able to establish a credit score for the first time.
Why we’re excited about José
José brings deep experience to the Financial Freedom conversation, having worked for two decades to help communities thrive financially. His mindset-shifting insights are rooted in the resilience and wisdom of low-income and immigrant communities, leveraging that know-how into formal financial power. His work with Mission Asset Fund is relevant for tens of millions of Americans who have little or no access to credit and who often turn to fringe financial services for their daily needs.
Health
Maintaining good health lowers the risk of losing a job due to health issues and minimizes the threat of losing savings to unforeseen medical debt. However, high insurance premiums, high deductibles and copays, limited coverage or lack of coverage, skyrocketing prescription medication costs, and lack of preventive care keep success in this driver out of reach for many strivers today.
Meet our Health Rule Breakers
Dan Weidenbenner, Mill Village
Financial Freedom Driver(s): Health, Education, and Work
Innovation
Dan Weidenbenner is working to break the cycle of poverty in Greenville, South Carolina, by sparking multigenerational change and driving upward economic mobility. He founded Mill Village as an umbrella organization with four distinct social enterprises. These social enterprises are transforming the communities in Greenville through healthy food (Mill Village Farms), social enterprises (Village Engage), entrepreneurship training (Village Launch), and sustainable transportation (Village Wrench). Together, these enterprises are providing countless hours of education and resources, with the end goal of empowering neighbors to better themselves, their families, and their futures. Dan and his team at Mill Village are equipping youth with jobs and life skills, providing reliable bicycle transportation for the most vulnerable, training community small business owners, and ensuring everyone in Greenville can afford fresh and healthy food. Dan has used a community development approach to organically grow Mill Village into a coalition of social enterprises that are working together to create multigenerational change.
Impact
Since 2018, Mill Village Farms has distributed more than 1 million pounds of food, distributed more than 68,000 fresh food boxes, and partnered with 40 community organizations. In 2022, Village Launch completed 1,142 hours of training with 64 entrepreneurs and 38 Business Entrepreneur Academy graduates. Village Wrench has repaired 560 bikes at free bike repair shops, trained 16 youth in its 6-Cycle program, and completed nearly 2,000 tune-ups and repairs at the Village Wrench bike shop.
Why we’re excited about Dan
Dan recognizes that sustainable change happens from the inside out. He’s implementing a holistic approach to community development that provides a sustainable framework for bringing neighbors to a place that is flourishing. The growth of Mill Village has been organic, with solutions birthed from real needs and the assets of people living in the community. The community is filling the gaps that the public and private sector aren’t addressing and, through the umbrella of several unique programs, helping more people in Greenville achieve upward mobility.
Education
Education is often the ticket to obtaining a higher-paying job. High tuition costs resulting in student loan debt, lack of access to financial aid, opportunity cost (the affordability factor of working vs. going to school), lack of access to important resources, and limited work-study programs are just a few obstacles to success in this driver.
Meet our Education Rule Breakers
Alexandra Bernadotte, Beyond 12
Financial Freedom Driver(s): Education
Innovation
Alexandra Bernadotte is founder and CEO of Beyond 12, a technology-based service nonprofit that, through a longitudinal student tracking platform and personalized student coaching service, helps high schools and colleges provide their students with the academic, social, and emotional support they need to succeed in higher education. By collecting and sharing data that spans the K-12 and higher education systems, Beyond 12 not only provides students with differentiated coaching that ensures they earn a college degree, but also provides actionable feedback to high schools about their college preparatory efforts, informs the retention work of colleges and universities, and influences the national conversation about student success.
Impact
Alexandra and her team work to increase the number of historically underrepresented students who graduate from our nation’s colleges and universities. Beyond 12, in partnership with K-12 and higher education institutions, is tracking 97,000 students through its Alumni Tracker and coaching more than 2,000 students on 180 college campuses. Eighty-five percent of students coached by Beyond 12 for a period of four years have graduated or maintained enrollment for six years, compared to the national average of 42%.
Why we’re excited about Alexandra
Alexandra brings 18 years of executive management and strategic development experience to Beyond 12 to further Financial Freedom through the driver of education. She has a proven track record, both nationally and internationally, of implementing programs and innovations within education systems that increase student retention and success.
Dan Weidenbenner, Mill Village
Financial Freedom Driver(s): Health, Education, and Work
Innovation
Dan Weidenbenner is working to break the cycle of poverty in Greenville, South Carolina, by sparking multigenerational change and driving upward economic mobility. He founded Mill Village as an umbrella organization with four distinct social enterprises. These social enterprises are transforming the communities in Greenville through healthy food (Mill Village Farms), social enterprises (Village Engage), entrepreneurship training (Village Launch), and sustainable transportation (Village Wrench). Together, these enterprises are providing countless hours of education and resources, with the end goal of empowering neighbors to better themselves, their families, and their futures. Dan and his team at Mill Village are equipping youth with jobs and life skills, providing reliable bicycle transportation for the most vulnerable, training community small business owners, and ensuring everyone in Greenville can afford fresh and healthy food. Dan has used a community development approach to organically grow Mill Village into a coalition of social enterprises that are working together to create multigenerational change.
Impact
Since 2018, Mill Village Farms has distributed more than 1 million pounds of food, distributed more than 68,000 fresh food boxes, and partnered with 40 community organizations. In 2022, Village Launch completed 1,142 hours of training with 64 entrepreneurs and 38 Business Entrepreneur Academy graduates. Village Wrench has repaired 560 bikes at free bike repair shops, trained 16 youth in its 6-Cycle program, and completed nearly 2,000 tune-ups and repairs at the Village Wrench bike shop.
Why we’re excited about Dan
Dan recognizes that sustainable change happens from the inside out. He’s implementing a holistic approach to community development that provides a sustainable framework for bringing neighbors to a place that is flourishing. The growth of Mill Village has been organic, with solutions birthed from real needs and the assets of people living in the community. The community is filling the gaps that the public and private sector aren’t addressing and, through the umbrella of several unique programs, helping more people in Greenville achieve upward mobility.
Work
Everyone needs a job, but a consistent source of income enables people to meet financial obligations, save money, and make investments in the future and in themselves. Low wages, lack of employer-provided benefits, unstable employment, and lack of advancement opportunities make it difficult for strivers to become thrivers.
Meet our Work Rule Breakers
Tim Lampkin, Higher Purpose Co.
Financial Freedom Driver (s): Work
Innovation
Tim Lampkin is founder and CEO of Higher Purpose Co., which works to build community wealth among Black entrepreneurs by supporting the growth of financial, cultural, and political power. In 2021, he was selected by Ashoka as its first lifetime fellow based in Mississippi for his innovation in bridging the racial wealth gap. An economic justice advocate, speaker, and social entrepreneur for more than a decade, Tim is currently creating disruptive programs that connect Black-owned businesses in Mississippi to valuable resources to help increase collective wealth, shared prosperity, and community-based knowledge.
Impact
Tim and Higher Purpose Co. are working across the Mississippi Delta, where they’ve helped launch more than 200 local ventures. His work has also helped other financial institutions improve and is centered on non-extractive methodologies and community-based knowledge that has the potential to drive economic and social change across rural American economies.
Why we’re excited about Tim
Tim and Higher Purpose Co. are helping Black citizens thrive as local entrepreneurs by ensuring that the capital meant to help underserved regions actually does so in the form of unconventional financial and loan products. He emphasizes access to capital and asset-building as essential levers for achieving financial stability and getting beyond coping. Tim is focused on addressing racial wealth in the United States, focusing his work and the broader conversation about Financial Freedom on this country’s racial legacy and the continued obstacles it presents to BIPOC Americans in particular.
Dan Weidenbenner, Mill Village
Financial Freedom Driver(s): Health, Education, and Work
Innovation
Dan Weidenbenner is working to break the cycle of poverty in Greenville, South Carolina, by sparking multigenerational change and driving upward economic mobility. He founded Mill Village as an umbrella organization with four distinct social enterprises. These social enterprises are transforming the communities in Greenville through healthy food (Mill Village Farms), social enterprises (Village Engage), entrepreneurship training (Village Launch), and sustainable transportation (Village Wrench). Together, these enterprises are providing countless hours of education and resources, with the end goal of empowering neighbors to better themselves, their families, and their futures. Dan and his team at Mill Village are equipping youth with jobs and life skills, providing reliable bicycle transportation for the most vulnerable, training community small business owners, and ensuring everyone in Greenville can afford fresh and healthy food. Dan has used a community development approach to organically grow Mill Village into a coalition of social enterprises that are working together to create multigenerational change.
Impact
Since 2018, Mill Village Farms has distributed more than 1 million pounds of food, distributed more than 68,000 fresh food boxes, and partnered with 40 community organizations. In 2022, Village Launch completed 1,142 hours of training with 64 entrepreneurs and 38 Business Entrepreneur Academy graduates. Village Wrench has repaired 560 bikes at free bike repair shops, trained 16 youth in its 6-Cycle program, and completed nearly 2,000 tune-ups and repairs at the Village Wrench bike shop.
Why we’re excited about Dan
Dan recognizes that sustainable change happens from the inside out. He’s implementing a holistic approach to community development that provides a sustainable framework for bringing neighbors to a place that is flourishing. The growth of Mill Village has been organic, with solutions birthed from real needs and the assets of people living in the community. The community is filling the gaps that the public and private sector aren’t addressing and, through the umbrella of several unique programs, helping more people in Greenville achieve upward mobility.
Housing
A home is a long-term investment and is central to wealth-building for many people. But rising home prices, tighter mortgage lending standards, high rent costs in relation to income, and limited supply are all factors that make housing unattainable and unaffordable for many people living paycheck to paycheck.
Meet our Housing Rule Breakers
Bree Jones, Parity Homes
Financial Freedom Driver(s): Housing
Innovation
At a moment when homeownership is increasingly out of reach for many, Bree Jones, founder of Baltimore-based Parity development company, is connecting families with opportunities to purchase affordable homes in hyper-vacant neighborhoods and, as a community, revive entire city blocks. Rather than attempting to sell a single renovated building on a mostly abandoned block, Parity pre-sells entire blocks of abandoned properties to pre-existing social networks. The company recruits cohorts of aspiring homeowners, helps them access financing, and, with their collective commitment to buy and live in restored homes, Parity can then finance the rehabilitation of entire blocks of abandoned rowhouses in historically significant Black neighborhoods.
Impact
Parity’s homebuyers go through a six-month cohort-based curriculum that helps them prepare for the financial aspects of homeownership and get them socially invested in the idea of “the collective.” In just three short years, the company has guided 60 homebuyers through its homeownership curriculum and has a waitlist of more than 400. Parity has site control on 53 properties and is currently renovating 10. Bree continues to lean into systems change solutions and advocate for new state and federal subsidy funding for affordable homeownership.
Why we’re excited about Bree
While most developers focus on affordable rentals, Bree and Parity are focused on affordable homeownership. Where most developers focus on relatively stabilized neighborhoods to reduce risk, Bree works in the communities deemed “unredeemable” by traditional institutions. And where most development causes displacement, Bree’s approach makes sure that legacy residents stay put. Parity’s work in Baltimore can serve as a new equitable development and affordable housing playbook that can be applied in other cities across the U.S. – especially those dealing with hyper vacancy, such as Chicago, Cleveland, and Detroit.
Kimberly Driggins, Washington Housing Conservancy
Financial Freedom Driver(s): Housing
Innovation
Kimberly Driggins is the executive director of the Washington Housing Conservancy (WHC). Launched in 2018, WHC acquires and preserves affordable rental housing, prevents displacement, and promotes economic mobility – especially for moderate- to low-income African Americans and other people of color. WHC is committed to creating thriving, inclusive, mixed-income communities throughout the Washington D.C. region.
Impact
Kimberly and her team at WHC focus on the “Missing Middle” – in particular, moderate- and low-income workers who find themselves increasingly priced out of Washington-area housing. The group has so far acquired more than 1,400 units in Arlington, Virginia; Hyattsville, Maryland; and Washington, D.C. – close to half of its initial goal of 3,000 units – helping more than 2,000 residents save between $1,200 and $9,000 on rent annually.
“We work to disrupt a system that favors ZIP codes over possibilities and barriers to success over bridges to a brighter future,” says Kimberly. “And in this time of so many challenges, I believe in the power of our intersecting principles to advance racial equity and inclusion, strive for universal quality, and promote trust and respect.”
Why we’re excited about Kimberly
Kimberly is a nationally recognized expert on urban placemaking and has spearheaded creative placemaking projects in both Detroit and Washington. She is a Rule Breaker, innovator, and disruptor who has a passion for creating housing stability for individuals and families so that they can build wealth and other opportunities in inclusive, mixed-income communities.
People have better access to social capital – in the form of networks, resources, and connections that really matter.
These are the things that open the doors to opportunities and enable those who need it most to get a hand up. The Motley Fool Foundation calls this “Fool Fuel,” and it’s the secret sauce in our Foolish Theory.
Mindsets shift and motivation takes center stage.
When people and organizations alike believe that Financial Freedom is possible and achievable – and when we join together to work in this unified belief – long-term change can become a reality.
Join the thousands who have already signed up to be a part of our
Fools For Good Community.
