Why I Started Guidefi

Despite years of working in the financial services industry, I struggled to find a financial advisor I could trust as a young single professional woman of color. The search became even more difficult once I got married and had a family. As a Southern Black American woman with roots in Emporia, Virginia who married an Nigerian American who grew up in Ibadan, Nigeria, my family’s money stories could not be more complicated. I wanted a financial advisor that could speak to and understand my family’s cultural complexities. But it was incredibly difficult to find that financial professional. The hunch that sparked Guidefi was that if finding a financial advisor was difficult for me, a finance professional, it must be extremely hard for the everyday worker, especially women and professionals of color.