My journey into financial planning started long before it became my career.

At 17 years old, I began teaching myself about personal finance, investing, credit, retirement accounts, and the financial system because I wanted to understand how money really worked. On my 18^th birthday I opened my first investment account, Roth IRA, and credit card to begin building the same financial habits I now encourage others to develop.

By the time I graduated high school, I already knew this was the field I wanted to dedicate my life to. I attended Northern Michigan University, where I earned a Bachelor of Science in Financial Management, graduated Summa Cum Laude with Highest Honors and a 3.96 GPA, and completed my degree a semester early. During college, I was selected as part of the university’s Student Managed Investment Fund, where I worked alongside a small group of students helping manage a portion of the university’s endowment investment portfolio. I also began working in the financial planning industry during my junior year of college and started completing my professional licensing before I even graduated. That early hands-on experience gave me the opportunity to work with a wide range of individuals and families, including teachers, healthcare professionals, engineers, business owners, retirees, and young professionals, all with different goals, concerns, and financial situations. Those experiences reinforced something I strongly believe today: good financial planning is about far more than investments alone. It’s about helping people make thoughtful decisions across every area of their financial life and giving them someone they can trust through all stages of life.

After college, my girlfriend of over five years and I made the move from Michigan to North Carolina alongside our two boxers to build the lifestyle and future we envisioned for ourselves. During that transition, I had several opportunities in front of me, but ultimately chose to join Thrivent because the company’s values aligned closely with my own, both personally and professionally.

As a Christian, faith, integrity, generosity, and serving others are all deeply important to me, and I wanted to build my career in an environment that genuinely reflected those values.

Today, I continue building my practice around relationships, education, and comprehensive financial planning. I currently hold my Series 7, Series 66, SIE, and Life & Health Insurance licenses. More than anything, I feel incredibly fortunate to do work that I genuinely enjoy. Learning about personal finance, investing, the economy, and the markets has never felt like “work” to me. It’s something I naturally spend time reading, researching, and learning about because I truly enjoy understanding how these things impact my own life, and I’m grateful that I get to use that knowledge to help others improve their financial futures as well.