Tyra Banks’ long-lasting career has been profound in so many ways and a large part of her success has to do with the advice given to her by her mother, Carolyn London, who is someone she has always acknowledged and credited as her biggest champion and supporter.
During ESSENCE Festival 2016, the supermodel, empowerment speaker and TyraBeauty creator described how her mother helped her understand financial competence at an early age to help her monopolize her wealth for years to come.
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“There was this Merrill Lynch adviser that my mom called when I was 19 years old and he only took an acccount if you had a million dollars or more to invest,” she shared. “My mom had $5,000 of my money and she went to him and she said, ‘My daughter is going to be really successful and I only have $5,000. I read about you [and] I know you’re really, really good. Will you take this account?’ He called my mom and was like ‘I’m so sorry, I can’t’ and my mom said ‘well, it’s your loss.’ He called back and he took it and I’m still with him to this day.”
Banks quickly learned that the lesson in managing her money would come from having a vision about how she could take what she had–no matter how little–and make it into something substantial.
The self-proclaimed visionary says her mother taught her strategy earlier in order to help navigate how she handles her business.
“To plan for the end at the beginning,” has become a mantra the model and now mother leans on and one she hopes to pass down to her son, York.
“I want to show him as a young Black man that his mommy is a powerhouse and he can be too.”
Whether it’s in financial wealth or otherwise, little York will be rich with knowledge and wisdom passed down from his mother from her own mom.
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