Embrace Financial Empowerment

Feel as confident about your finances as you do about every other aspect of your life.

No one cares as much about your financial health as you do. I will empower and educate you to take the best possible care of your money and, by extension, yourself.

Start your Financial Consultation

Embrace Financial Empowerment

Financial Consultations With Liz

No one cares as much about your financial health as you do. I will empower and educate you to take the best possible care of your money and, by extension, yourself.

Start your Financial Consultation

Do you ever feel like this?

“I should know how to manage my money. At my age, I shouldn’t still be confused by this!”

“The last financial advisor I went to didn’t listen to me and used all kinds of jargon and acronyms I didn’t understand. It was so confusing that I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do next.”

“I’m worried I’ve done the wrong thing for so many years that I won’t be able to fix it. Do I even have enough time left to save for retirement?”

“I’m frustrated with how poorly I’ve managed my money over the years. I’m too embarrassed to even ask for help at this point.”

“I am the only person I know who doesn’t have their money under control.”

If that sounds familiar, I can help!

I will meet you where you’re at with your money–whether that means helping you figure out what you’re spending every month or advising you on detailed tax-advantaged strategies to facilitate early retirement.

I’m here for it all. What can I say? There’s nothing I love more than helping people with their money. Well, pastries might be loved more, but let’s not get into that…

Start your Financial Consultation

After years of putting this off, I finally took the dive to dig deep into my financial health. I couldn’t have done this without Liz. She’s knowledgeable, practical & empathetic in her approach. She has done wonders to help me understand my current financial health and what I need to do to get to a more secure place.

R.Y.

Pediatrician

Meet Your Financial Consultant

Hi, I’m Liz,

– though officially it’s Elizabeth Willard Thames – and I’m the creator of the award-winning personal finance blog, Frugalwoods.com, author of the book, Meet The Frugalwoods: Achieving Financial Independence Through Simple Living and a financial consultant.

I’ve been featured for my work on The Today Show, PBS, NPR, in the New York Times, Forbes, Parents Magazine and more. I received a BA from the University of Kansas, an MA from American University and then worked in the non-profit sector for a decade.

I now live on a homestead in rural Vermont with my husband, our two young children and nine chickens. When I’m not helping people with their money, I love to hike, do yoga, sing in my church’s choir, garden very badly, ski (also pretty badly), have bonfires with friends, go on dates with my husband and chase our kids (and chickens) around the yard.

My story

When’s The Right Time to Hire Me?

You have no idea when you’ll be able to actually retire.

You realize it’s been six months since you logged into your savings account.

You’re overwhelmed by your debt and not sure of the best way to pay it off.

You have no idea if you’ll be able to pay for your kids’ college.

You’re confused by your investments and not sure if they’re right for you.

Bottom Line: you’re so done being confused and disorganized with your money and you’re not sure how to get on the right track.

Let’s work together to ensure you’re leading the life you want, not the life your finances are forcing on you.

Book a Free 30-minute Call

After Our Financial Consultation:

You will be able to let go of financial anxiety because you’ll understand your money, what it’s doing, what changes you need to make and how to execute those changes.

You’ll feel confident about when you can retire and that you won’t run out of money in retirement.

You will no longer struggle trying to figure out how and/or if you can pay for your kids’ college.

You’ll have a roadmap for paying off your debt.

You will understand why investing is important, what investing vehicles are available to you, how to get started and how to optimize your existing investments.

You’ll have savings and investing goals. You’ll know how to track your progress and make those goals a reality

You will no longer carry around shame or guilt about your money. Instead, you’ll feel empowered and confident.

As your parents age, you’ll have a clear idea of how much you’ll be able to support them financially.

You will no longer feel alone on your financial journey!

Schedule a free call today to embark on a transformative financial journey.

Book a Free 30-minute Call

Here’s How We’ll Work Together:

I will listen with compassion as you outline your hopes, fears and goals about your money and your life. It’s my job to figure out how we can craft your finances to make your best future possible. I will build a comprehensive map of your finances and a plan for you to follow.

I will ensure that you understand your financial plan and all of the next steps you need to take.

You will emerge from the consultation process confident about your next money steps, empowered to manage your money for the long term and at peace with your financial future.

Our sessions are confidential & judgement-free

My Services

I’m transparent about my pricing because I don’t believe in hidden fees or upselling.

Financial Second Opinion

$1,500

For people who are financially savvy and want a second opinion on their financial trajectory. I’ll provide feedback, check your assumptions, raise questions you haven’t considered & help you feel confident about the financial strategies you’ve mapped out.

Access to my custom financial organization workbooks, which you’ll complete and send to me prior to our call.
An in-depth 90-minute conversation about your finances. You will no longer be alone on your financial journey—I’ll be there to bounce ideas off of.
Prior to our conversation, I will study your workbooks and come prepared with feedback, advice and questions to help you optimize your financial future.
This package does not include a written financial plan or software-based financial modeling and forecasting.
This is intended for people who’ve already created a financial plan for themselves.

Book Financial Second Opinion

✶ Most Popular ✶

Complete Financial Consultation

$3,500

For folks who need a complete financial plan and analysis of their financial future. No prior money experience required!

A complete written financial plan addressing all aspects of your finances, including custom retirement projections made with retirement modeling software. This plan will teach you how to manage your money, answer your questions and provide a set of detailed next steps.
Access to my custom financial organization workbooks.
Three sessions to discuss your goals, compile your information and review your complete financial plan.
A final session one month after you receive your plan. We’ll discuss your progress, address questions that have cropped up and ensure you’re on track for executing your longer-term goals.

Book Complete Financial Consultation

Complex Financial Consultation

$5,500

For folks who want a hands-on approach or have complex financial situations, including more than one rental property and/or a small business.

A complete written financial plan addressing all aspects of your finances, including custom retirement projections made with retirement modeling software. This plan will teach you how to manage your money, answer your questions and provide a set of detailed next steps.
Access to my custom financial organization workbooks, which I will complete for you. No need to know your financial details ahead of time!
At this level, you send me your raw data and I take care of aggregating it for you.
Three sessions to discuss your goals, compile your information and review your complete financial plan.
A final session one month after you receive your plan. We’ll discuss your progress, address questions that have cropped up and ensure you’re on track for executing your longer-term goals.

Book Complex Financial Consultation

Not sure which package is right for you?

Book a complimentary 30-minute discovery call to figure it out together.

Book a Free 30-Min Call

Please note: I don’t offer consultations on detailed business accounting practices, in-depth travel hacking, crypto, dividend investing or other unusual investing avenues, or real estate investing (beyond the basics).

Happy Clients

As we near retirement age, my husband and I were concerned that we weren’t making the right decisions to prepare for that step. Liz was incredible to work with. She walked us through our finances and helped us with changes we could make to ensure we’re set up for the future.

She is also extremely insightful as, with the minimal information we provided on the worksheet, she was able to pinpoint retirement goals that we hadn’t even considered but love! My husband and I have been discussing how kind and knowledgeable Liz was and how she diminished our stress and made us confident that we’ll be ready for retirement. We strongly recommend her!

C.P. and S.P.,

Attorney and Medical Imaging Software R&D

I worked with Liz at a moment of complete stress and terror in my life as my husband lost his job due to the pandemic. I suddenly became the primary breadwinner in our family and felt completely panicked. She stayed calm, clear, and persistently focused on supporting me to see the financial reality of my situation.

She empowered me to see the numbers through the panic and grounded me in the knowledge that was underneath my fears. I can’t imagine having made it through this dicey period in my life without her AND I have more skills, knowledge, and confidence on the other side of our work together. She is an invaluable resource. I can’t recommend her enough!

M.H.

Leadership and Career Coach

I knew our financial picture wasn’t great before I invited Liz into our lives to create a comprehensive financial plan. My husband and I recently retired, but we weren’t clear on how much we could spend each month and still have savings.

What Liz offered was clarity from a neutral 3rd party. Her financial report gave us a clear picture of where we are and a roadmap to lead us where we need to go. Discussions about money with my husband became much more productive–we are on the same team now.
Liz patiently walked me through the plan and all the options for how to shape our future financial picture. We are so grateful to Liz for sharing her wisdom!

A.W.

Retired Teacher

As a single parent of a college student, I have mainly focused on saving, living within my means, and having as little debt as possible. Outside of that, I had no idea what to do with my money. I was at a loss as to my next steps after paying down debt and maintaining a healthy emergency account.

Liz patiently addressed my questions and concerns with actionable, easy-to-understand steps and suggestions. Liz’s advice and guidance were well worth the money spent. After completing the consultation, I now better understand my financial situation and have the confidence and knowledge needed to reach new financial goals.

A.J.

Registered Nurse

I reached out for a financial consultation because I had specific questions I wanted help with based on my situation. Questions like at what age can I retire? How much will I need to retire? How much do we need to save per year? Not only did Liz answer all the questions we had, she gave us a very specific plan to follow. She also gave us all of the reason and math behind her answers so we can adjust as needed as life goes on.

I was pleasantly surprised at how easy it was to fill out the paperwork and go over our plan with Liz. She is so friendly and easy to talk to! I’m so happy we now know exactly what to do to reach our financial goals!

A.F.

Clinical Trials Manager

Working with Liz was easily the best decision I made when planning my exit from the corporate world. Early retirement is pretty black & white from a numbers standpoint, but when making the leap became a near-term reality, the emotional and psychological elements were far more difficult to navigate. Liz was able to quickly read our situation and steer our engagement with her towards these areas, transparently sharing her own FIRE experience (good and bad) which helped my wife and I find clarity in our plans and decision making around our future lifestyle design. Ultimately, working with Liz helped us to finally pull the trigger on our early retirement dreams and do so confidently knowing we had a comprehensive plan firmly in place.

A.R.

Reached Financial Independence In Fall 2023

FAQs

No, I am not a licensed financial advisor, certified public accountant or investment adviser. Traditional financial advisors are not in the business of educating their clients. Rather, they typically prefer for clients to NOT ask a lot of questions and have a relatively low financial IQ so that they can select investments that benefit the advisor with kick-backs. Unsurprisingly, these investments aren’t always in the best interest of the client.

I don’t manage your money for you. Rather, I educate and empower you to manage your own money.

Financial management isn’t rocket science. Investment firms and advisors throw around tons of jargon to scare us into thinking we can’t manage our own money. But for the vast majority of people in the vast majority of situations? That’s just not true.

Yes! You can learn what you need to know in order to make informed, wise financial choices at every stage of your life. I will give you the tools you need to understand your money and a plan to works towards your financial goals. We’ll review and discuss everything as many times as you want.

If you don’t understand the financial plan I create for you, I haven’t done my job.

Absolutely not. I dig into the nuances of your financial life–and life life–to ensure my advice is specifically tailored to what you need. I’ll review every aspect of your life that has a dollar sign as well as your aspirations and goals. The most important factor here is what you want to do with your money. Also, I love lattes.

Nope! Nor do I want to. Since I don’t work for a company or an investment firm, my incentives are aligned with yours—I want what’s best for YOU, not what’s best for a company’s bottom line. I don’t profit from giving anyone bad financial advice – quite the opposite, in fact.

No, all of my consultations are conducted via video call. You’ll book a time that works for you and we’ll convene on the screen. We can do audio-only if you prefer.

Not unless you want to! I’m not all that frugal myself, I just like the name since I live on a homestead in the woods of rural Vermont. Also, “moneywoods” sounds too weird.

Probably so and it’s probably not as super-weird as you think. I’ve seen A LOT of people’s money and it would take A LOT to shock me.

You can always book a free 30-minute call to make sure I can help you. There are some strange little corners of personal finance that I don’t have the expertise to help you with and I’m happy to chat before you book a consultation.

Absolutely! I’ve worked with gay, lesbian, straight, queer, bisexual and polyamorous people. I’ve worked with women, non-binary folks and men. I’ve worked with transgender and cisgender people. All are welcome, affirmed and supported.

Everyone deserves a healthy financial future.

No. I’ve worked with clients with net worths ranging from -$300k to $5M+.

Don’t worry if you’re not sure what “net worth” means, let alone what yours is. I’m here to help you with that.

Absolutely not. I’m going to work with what you already have.

There are no “get rich quick schemes” that actually work, so we’ll be operating solely in the world of non-scammy reality.

100%. I’m here because Google doesn’t do a very good job of listening to you, reassuring you that you’re on the right track and tailoring financial advice to your specific questions, circumstances and goals.

I’m not a fact machine – I’m a financial friend and resource. I’m not going to bullshit you, I don’t have some secret knowledge that you can’t find on the internet. What I have instead is compassion, empathy and experience.

Because the opportunity costs of not getting on top of your financial situation are enormous. In addition to the monetary costs of not properly managing your money, there’s the intense emotional toll that financial anxiety and stress exact on your life.

Absolutely! Email me at [email protected] and I’ll be happy to share with you.

Have more questions?

Book a Free 30-minute Call

Liz is so insightful and thoughtful, and gave me pragmatic, meaningful advice that works with my life. I felt incredibly seen and heard by her.

She truly took the time to ask important questions, learn about me, my family and my values, and tailor her advice to my and my family’s unique needs. Grateful to have the opportunity to work one on one with her.

S.M.

Attorney

Take Control of Your Financial Future

I can help you with any question you have about your money

I’ll help you understand your entire financial situation, set clear goals, and provide practical solutions for managing your money.

Wondering if I can help you? Book a free 30-minute call and we’ll talk it through.

Book a Free 30-Minute Call