This is where the second season begins, and it is different from anything the show has done before. Esther and Dr. Rich Stowell pull up extra chairs and invite you into the real work of building generational wealth as a family. Real numbers, real mistakes, real wins, and children in the room for all of it.

At the table

Esther and Rich open Legacy at the Table, a season built around one question: how do you actually build wealth that outlives you, with your family involved rather than protected from it? This is not a finance lecture. It is a family showing its work.

What this conversation covers

• Why generational wealth is a family practice, not a private spreadsheet
• The money messages we inherit, and the ones we choose to pass on
• Building with your children in the room instead of shielding them from it
• Faith and stewardship as the foundation, not an afterthought
• What the season ahead will cover, and why the process is the lesson

A line worth keeping

This is not another finance podcast where an expert tells you to skip the lattes and you will be a millionaire.

Mentioned in this episode

• Legacy at the Table, the season built around real family wealth-building
• The Broker's Table community, for women building faith, family, and lasting wealth

The Broker's Table is hosted by Esther Jackson-Stowell. New conversations on faith, family, and the kind of wealth that outlives you.

Here's what nobody told me growing up.

Wealth isn't something that happens to you.

It's something that you build on purpose, with intention.

And the biggest mistakes most families make, they leave their kids

out of the conversation entirely.

We spent years doing it the hard way, learning from expensive

mistakes, figuring things out alone.

And one day, we looked at each other and said, "Our kids are

not going to start from zero.

They're going to start here

This season on The Broker's Table, we're pulling back the curtain.

This is Legacy at the Table.

Welcome to The Broker's Table.

I'm Esther Jackson Stowell And I'm Rich Stowell.

This season is called Legacy at the Table, and it's different

from anything we've done before.

We're pulling up extra chairs, and we're inviting you to sit

in on real conversations about money, family, faith, and legacy.

Let me tell you what this is not.

This is not another finance podcast where some expert tells you to skip

the lattes and you'll be a millionaire.

That's not real life.

And this isn't theory.

We're not reading from textbooks.

This is how we're actually building generational wealth with our

children involved, with real numbers, real mistakes, and real wins.

We have four children, and they're going to be in on this show.

You're gonna hear from them directly.

We've been on this journey privately for years, but we kept

having the same conversations.

Why didn't anyone teach us this?

Why did we have to figure this out alone?

And we realized if we're asking that question, thousands

of other families are, too.

So we decided to build in public.

Not because we have it all figured out, but because the process of

figuring it out is the lesson.

Here's what we're asking of you.

Don't just listen passively.

This isn't entertainment.

It's education.

We want you to pause the episode and have conversations with your family.

We've created a workbook, Legacy at the Table, that goes

along with this entire season.

Every episode connects to specific exercises you can do together as a family.

It's designed to be worked through together.

Your kids should hear these conversations.

Age-appropriate, yes, but they should be at the table.

In my house growing up, money was invisible.

My parents worked hard.

I saw that, but I never saw a budget, never heard a conversation

about savings or investing.

Money was just something that either was there or wasn't.

More importantly, money came from a very specific source, my dad.

The message I absorbed, money is stressful, so don't talk about it.

Money's complicated, so don't ask questions.

And somehow money is supposed to just work out.

So when did you realize that that wasn't gonna work, and what beliefs did you

carry from your childhood into adulthood?

Well, it was very interesting because when I got to college, that's where I had to

create a budget because without a budget I wasn't able to, take care of my bills and

take care of things that I needed as well.

So I carried this belief that wealthy people were somehow different, like

there was a club I wasn't invited to.

I thought you either had the money gene or you didn't.

I was born into a wealthy family, so that would simply be my life.

I just assumed that would simply be my life.

You had the money gene.

But that was not the case.

I had the gene, but I didn't have the, skills and the tools.

Okay, so you're in college, and you are now starting to realize

that life is different from when you were just relying on your dad.

Mm-hmm was there a specific moment that you realized something had to change?

There were several for me, but the one that stood out the most was,

paying for my school fees for college.

And at the time, I had financial aid, so it was easy to have, the

leftover money, but that leftover funds needed to last for, three months

because we're in a quarter system.

And to stretch $1,500 at that time was very, very tough because that money needed

to be split between rent, between gas, and basic necessities, also including books.

So that was the moment that I realized I needed more than just waiting for

the leftover financial aid check.

I needed to get a job.

I needed to get a job, and I also needed to figure out how to manage my

time because I was also taking classes.

So how do I get a job, make money, and then also budget everything

so that I wasn't kicked out of my apartment or kicked out of school?

So there was a lot to learn, and I'm appreciative of that opportunity.

But that would have gone a lot easier if someone had taught me

those things, and that's what we're looking to do here for everyone else.

So what was your early relationship with money, and what, lessons did you learn

from that to carry you over as you…

into adulthood?

Yeah.

Growing up, we were lower middle class, I would say, and my parents did fine

with the budget, and they tried to teach us how to save, to work hard, to, only

spend our money on what was necessary.

So while it was responsible, we developed a vocabulary around

the idea of scarcity, I think.

Mm. I mean, my parents are both baby boomers.

Their parents grew up during the Depression, and so I think they were

instilled with that idea that, you know, this could all go away at any moment.

And, I mean, that's a deep, deeply held belief, so it just,

it influenced their practices.

And so it was more about holding onto what you have and being responsible

with what you have instead of, say, for instance, building more or putting

your money to work for you- Interesting

or building passive income streams or looking for more opportunity.

So I think I carried that into adulthood, and I'm still learning.

I'm still trying to learn lessons to expand beyond that.

So what happened when you started making your own money?

Well, I think everybody who has that taste of earning, you know, has a moment

where they can realize something very, very powerful, that I can create, right?

And, so as a young man, when I started earning, I was faced with that choice.

Do I, focus on what I have and trying to protect that or what I could have?

And I think that's the difference.

You know, like I, I remember faced with a kind of a budget crisis one

time, and my older brother told me,

you're always gonna have more opportunity if you look for ways to earn what you

don't already have- Mm-hmm … than ways to conserve what you do have." I mean,

'cause what you do have is always limited.

Mm-hmm.

But what you don't have is unlimited.

Mm-hmm.

So if you can go add to that side of the ledger, you're, you know,

you're gonna be in a much better position, that's a total mind shift.

Mindset, mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Absolutely.

So I think, as far as mistakes go, it's… I, I would think they're opportunities

missed to make money work for you, to really harness the power of compounding.

How many of us, if we could go back 30 years, or, you know, if you're

25 years old, go back 10 years and say, "Man, if I could just put, like,

$100 in this stock," or even just an interest-bearing account and let it

compound for 10 years, massive, right?

But, you know, at our age, if we could go back 20 years to when we were first

married- Mm-hmm … and we just put a small amount into these compounding

mechanisms and stayed disciplined with it, I mean, it's massive.

And we have done that.

Mm-hmm.

But, you know, you look back and, you think, "Well, why didn't we do more?"

Yes.

Why didn't we double that small investment and maybe add incrementally to it monthly?

Mm. And then, you know, we'd be looking at quadruple, quintuple,

10X what our original investment is.

So I think that's the lesson that, that I think anybody at any time should take.

Just start now, but start.

Don't look at what you have right now.

Look at what it could become into the future.

Absolutely.

So I hear compounding, and that's what we wanna teach our children because they have

that opportunity now to learn that, and they're young enough to learn that, and

they don't have the responsibilities that you and I have at this stage in our life.

Mm-hmm.

So we wanna show them that, and this is what we're trying to

show everyone else, to start now.

Start now where you are with your children.

Bring them into these conversations and let them be aware so that

they can learn and be comfortable having these conversations.

Let me break down something that changed everything for us.

There's a difference between income and wealth.

Income is money you earn.

Wealth is money that works for you.

You can have a six-figure income and be flat broke.

You can have a modest income and build generational wealth.

The difference?

Systems.

Yeah, I say wealth is confidence.

Wealth is knowing how you can put your money to work for you.

Many of us live paycheck to paycheck and, you know, I know people who

make less than I do, but they've got systems in place to build that wealth.

To me, they're more confident.

They've got more command of their environment.

They're more confident going out in the world and, you know, that's where

we're trying to get, that's where we're trying to get our kids at, is

knowing what that money can do for you.

Mm-hmm.

That's confidence, that's power, but it starts with some education.

Absolutely.

Building wealth comes down to three things: mindset, systems, and consistency.

Mindset is what you believe about money.

If you believe wealth is for other people, you'll never build it.

Your beliefs become your ceiling.

And systems are the structures that make wealth-building automatic.

Automatic savings, accounts with specific purposes, a plan for credit, and I would

also say the discipline that comes with, being able to say no to some things so you

can say yes to other things down the road.

Absolutely.

And consistency is showing up day after day, month after month,

even when you don't feel like it, especially when you don't feel like it.

Here's what most parents get wrong.

They think protecting their kids from money stress means hiding

money conversations entirely.

But silence doesn't protect children.

It confuses them.

Kids who are never included in financial discussions grow up financially

illiterate, and then we wonder why they make the same mistakes we did.

Yeah, so our kids sit at our table.

We force, we force them to be included in those conversations about

money, about budget, about goals.

Yes, we keep it age appropriate, but we, let them be participants

in our wealth building strategies.

One more thing.

We're people of faith, and our faith teaches us that

we're stewards, not owners.

The wealth we build isn't just for us.

It's a responsibility.

That means we're not building wealth to show off.

We're building it to serve, to give our children options, to help our

community, to leave something meaningful.

Yeah, I like what you said about that legacy is not about

showing off or being flashy.

It's about Being intentional.

Absolutely.

So I think about legacy in terms of, like the s- being stewards, right?

We have these things, and our job isn't just to come and enjoy it, and

spend it all, and then we die, and then nobody else gets to enjoy it.

Our legacy is to leave something impactful behind.

Sometimes not just money.

It's how, are people thinking moving forward?

Are they growing?

Are they growing in faith?

Are they growing in wealth?

Are they growing in just, in knowledge?

Like, legacy is not just monetary thing.

It's a lot more about, you know, a lot more, and it'll impact the masses, right?

Because one person knowing how to do something right will now have a ripple

effect in, over generations to come.

Yeah, I think of legacy in terms of how, somebody made somebody feel- Mm … or how

they maybe changed somebody's direction.

So the immediate legacy that we think of with our kids is just what,

direction are we giving our kids?

You know, when we pass on, our kids are gonna have their own families.

What did we do for them?

But the real legacy comes in the next generation and the following generation.

Are they speaking appreciatively?

Nobody's gonna speak appreciatively of your money.

Like, "Oh, you know, my grandpa was so great because he was rich."

I've never heard anybody say that.

But you do hear, people talk about legacy in terms of what people did with

their interactions with other people.

Mm-hmm.

And when you have wealth, when you have that confidence and that independence, you

are free to bring your God-given talents to bear in, like, the most incredible

ways, and not just chasing a paycheck, not just going to work nine to five, but

actually making a difference in the world.

Mm. I like that.

Before our next episode, I want you to do what we just did.

Write your money story.

It doesn't have to be long.

Even a page is enough.

Answer these questions: What did you learn about money growing up?

What beliefs did you absorb?

What was your first financial wake-up call?

Then share that story with your partner if you have one.

You might be surprised how different your stories are, and

that difference can explain a lot about how you handle money together.

In our workbook, there's an exercise for creating a family

wealth mission statement.

This is a short statement that captures what money is for in your family.

Ours is displayed in our home.

Our kids helped us write it, and it helps remind us what we're building

toward when the day-to-day gets hard.

Yeah.

Here's a template.

Our family believes money is a tool for blank.

We are committed to building wealth that blank.

Our legacy will be blank.

Finally, put a date on the calendar for a family money meeting.

It doesn't have to be long.

30 minutes is plenty.

The agenda is simple.

What are we grateful for?

What are our goals?

What's one thing we can do this month to move closer?

Your kids should be there They have to be there They have to be there.

Yes, even the young ones.

They absorb more than you think.

They do.

Legacy isn't accidental.

It's built on purpose one decision at a time.

You don't need to be rich to start.

It helps.

You need to start to become wealthy, and wealthy isn't just about the bank account.

It's about knowledge.

It's about the knowledge.

It's about the systems.

It's about the values you pass down.

Listen, your children are watching, not just what you say

about money, but what you do.

Make it worth watching.

Absolutely.

Next week, we're going deeper.

Episode two is about the money conversations that most

families never have and why that silence cost us generationally.

We'll give you exact scripts for starting these conversations with your family.

Until then, do the work.

Write your story.

Start the conversation, and we'll see you at the table.

This has been The Broker's Table, Legacy at the Table.

Legacy isn't accidental.

It's built on purpose.