Who I Am

Most importantly, I am the mother of two adult children.  As my children were moving from their teens into their 20s, I found that I was frequently a resource on many, many financial decisions and that I had insights and information I could provide to them on a wide array of financial decisions.  Recently, I was talking with a young man and found that I had a lot of information that could be valuable to him, too. Those experiences were the beginning of this blog.I am also a retired property-casualty actuary (someone who works with the math and statistics related to insurance).  I spent a significant portion of my career building statistical models of all of the financial risks of an insurance company and interpreting their findings to help senior management make better financial decisions.  I retired in my late 50’s, which one of my daughter’s friends thought clearly qualified me to write this blog.

What I’m Not

While I have lots of insights, personal experience, business experience and knowledge related to financial literacy topics, I do NOT have any designations or specific qualifications that make me an expert.   Please keep that in mind as you read the blog postings.

About the Blog

The mission of Financial IQ by Susie Q is to provide clear, practical, unbiased information to help people, Millennials in particular, make better financial decisions.  It has become clear that society in general and individuals in particular struggle when they don’t understand their financial decisions. In the financial crisis starting in 2008, many people lost their homes because they didn’t understand the terms of their mortgages or they bought houses with mortgages they couldn’t afford.  At the same time, at least according to the press, AIG (a very large financial services company) had to be supported by the US government because it made investments in one department that were not fully understood. My goal is to help you avoid some of these same mistakes. As one of my friends said, “Can you imagine how much less painful the 2008-2010 period would have been if everyone had understood their financial decisions?”Over time, this blog will cover budgeting, insurance, mortgages, other types of loans, savings, investment options, retirement savings and many more topics.  If you don’t see a topic that interests you, be sure to send an e-mail on the Contact Me page. Some of these topics will be covered by guest bloggers who will provide their professional affiliations.  That will be the closest thing you will see to an advertisement on this site. To support the blog’s mission, it will not accept any advertising to avoid any appearance of a conflict of interest.

My Thanks

This blog would not be possible without all of the technical and marketing assistance and encouragement of my daughter, Anna.  Thank you!