Matt Cimaglia's GenXpense.com: Financial Solutions for Young Adults
Matt took his Full Sail film degree and production company experience and launched an innovative tool for aspiring investors
The world of finance can be intimidating for those who are unfamiliar with it. College students and recent graduates often enter the real world with only a vague grasp on concepts such as saving and investing, paying off their student loans, and stock options trading. With that in mind, Full Sail Film graduate Matt Cimaglia founded GenXpense.com, a website that offers free financial information using media-rich content specifically aimed at the aforementioned demographic group.
“It’s generally assumed that college kids and young adults are clueless about their financial future. I personally have been fortunate to know a lot of people in the financial industry, so when I graduated from school and began dealing with money management both personally and professionally, I was able to go to them for some pretty sound advice,” Matt says. “But I found that the majority of my friends unfortunately didn’t have those resources.”
Inspired to empower his peers by breaking down financial concepts in a clear and intuitive manner, Matt has spent nearly three years building and growing GenXpense.com. Drawing upon his work experience as an editor and producer for his own production company Cimaglia Productions (whose credits include work on NBC shows like Dateline, TODAY, and NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams), Matt has employed video streams as a key element in delivering the site’s information.
GenXpense offers short and informative videos featuring financial experts speaking on a variety of topics, from investing tax refunds to retirement planning to the merits of buying versus renting a home. The media is also accompanied by interactive pop-up resources such as a Future Investing Calculator, Buy Vs. Rent Calculator, and a College Loan Calculator.
“When it comes to reading financial trade magazines or The Wall Street Journal or even other website blogs, I feel like a lot of what’s out there is just jargon – words and terms that a lot of people just don’t understand,” he says. “But they can really learn a lot from the way that we present information on this website because it’s not just text-based. It’s something that you can watch, and it’s an entertaining story. The basic idea of GenXpense is to make people feel comfortable about their finances, and we are really able to do that by showing them information through the eyes of their peers.”
That effort has not gone unnoticed. GenXpense has been featured on Forbes.com, NBC’s TODAY show, and on Yahoo! Finance. With Cimaglia Productions continuing to grow and plans to further the interaction between GenXpense’s users as another driving force behind the site’s content, it doesn’t look like Matt’s schedule is going to slow down any time soon.
“Time management is a key element in my daily life,” he says. “But I really think that people shouldn’t focus on just one thing. Having your hands in a few pots really allows you to expand your knowledge base. I’ve definitely learned a lot from developing GenXpense that has helped my production company and vice versa.”
Click here to check out the financial tools available at GenXpense.com
“It’s generally assumed that college kids and young adults are clueless about their financial future. I personally have been fortunate to know a lot of people in the financial industry, so when I graduated from school and began dealing with money management both personally and professionally, I was able to go to them for some pretty sound advice,” Matt says. “But I found that the majority of my friends unfortunately didn’t have those resources.”
Inspired to empower his peers by breaking down financial concepts in a clear and intuitive manner, Matt has spent nearly three years building and growing GenXpense.com. Drawing upon his work experience as an editor and producer for his own production company Cimaglia Productions (whose credits include work on NBC shows like Dateline, TODAY, and NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams), Matt has employed video streams as a key element in delivering the site’s information.
GenXpense offers short and informative videos featuring financial experts speaking on a variety of topics, from investing tax refunds to retirement planning to the merits of buying versus renting a home. The media is also accompanied by interactive pop-up resources such as a Future Investing Calculator, Buy Vs. Rent Calculator, and a College Loan Calculator.
“When it comes to reading financial trade magazines or The Wall Street Journal or even other website blogs, I feel like a lot of what’s out there is just jargon – words and terms that a lot of people just don’t understand,” he says. “But they can really learn a lot from the way that we present information on this website because it’s not just text-based. It’s something that you can watch, and it’s an entertaining story. The basic idea of GenXpense is to make people feel comfortable about their finances, and we are really able to do that by showing them information through the eyes of their peers.”
That effort has not gone unnoticed. GenXpense has been featured on Forbes.com, NBC’s TODAY show, and on Yahoo! Finance. With Cimaglia Productions continuing to grow and plans to further the interaction between GenXpense’s users as another driving force behind the site’s content, it doesn’t look like Matt’s schedule is going to slow down any time soon.
“Time management is a key element in my daily life,” he says. “But I really think that people shouldn’t focus on just one thing. Having your hands in a few pots really allows you to expand your knowledge base. I’ve definitely learned a lot from developing GenXpense that has helped my production company and vice versa.”
Click here to check out the financial tools available at GenXpense.com
