Community Ladders

If it weren’t for Bill, who founded Community Ladders, my family would still be drowning in debt. He helped us refinance our house and still keep lots of equity. It’s not an overstatement that he saved our lives. I can’t recommend him highly enough. He’s honest, tenacious and accommodating, taking my phone calls anytime of the day. He was very encouraging, which helped us immensely. We were able to get the refi done in a matter of a couple of weeks.
To put it in perspective, we tried to refinance with Washington Home Mortgage about a year ago and it was the most horrible experience we’ve ever had. The process lasted over four months, the mortgage officer was rude, constantly complaining about how long his commute is (uh, not our problem??). He once YELLED at me over the phone. His boss, Diego Calderon, who is the president of WASHINGTON HOME MORTGAGE, was impossible to get a hold of. The paperwork was endless and the lender was miserable and in the end, we walked away when we discovered over $ 18,000 in hidden fees. There are a lot of nasty people out there.
Bill’s one of the good ones. I can’t recommend Community Ladders highly enough. If I could give a million stars, I would.

I am writing an update because Bill just did a fabulous job advising me on my refinance of my home loan. If it weren’t for Bill’s guidance, I wouldn’t have been able to do the refinance I wanted. He was strategic, smart, and tenacious. I can’t recommend him highly enough.

I’m not even technically a Community Ladders client yet, but Bill has helped me more than all of the people who actually stood to make money off of me combined. I recommend them wholeheartedly.
I’m in the daunting process of trying to buy my first house, and my personal finances were a hot mess. A friend from the dog park referred me to Bill when my first deal started to go pear-​shaped. I was blown away by how much time and energy Bill devoted to advising me, running different scenarios, researching, and generally talking me off a few different ledges. Everyone else in the process was just yes-​ing me to death — my agent, the various mortgage brokers — but Bill gave me the much-​needed dose of reality. I ended up killing that deal (oh, and p. s. Bill was right: he worried that my contract price was too high, and the house immediately sold for $ 30K less than my contract price).
In the meantime, and thanks to Bill’s advice, I’ve worked on reducing my expenses and fixing a lot of Bad on my credit report. I’m in a much, much better financial position now, just a month and a half later, and just about ready to try that whole homebuying thing again. Thanks, Bill!
Oh, and the only reason I’m not yet a Community Ladders client is that they have a waiting list. They’re that good. So you should sign up now — but I’m first!

I’ve just started with Community Ladders, but am already very impressed by the advice and services, and look forward to working with them for the long term. It’s an incredible service that addresses the financial decisions most people are facing — mortgages, retirement, budgeting, short term savings, job changes, etc. It’s not just investment management, which is what I found when looking for financial advice at large companies, although they can advise on that too!
I really love their ongoing membership model ($ 40/​month, less if you make under $ 80K) which gets you quarterly meetings, as well as anytime access to your adviser via email. I’ve been surprised at how responsive they are to emails! It’s like having ²⁴⁄₇ access to financial advice.
I’ve already more than recouped the value of a membership in my first session. I walked away with a prioritized, concrete to-​do list for the financial decisions I was facing.
Bill is also great to work with — knowledgeable, genuine, passionate about what he does, and incredibly accessible even if you don’t have a strong understanding of particular finance issues. I’d recommend Bill and Community Ladders to anyone!

I’ve been with Community Ladders for 3 months, so really just getting started, but I highly recommend them to people looking for financial planning without arm twisting to buy particular products.
In my first 2 hour session, we went through all my finances, my long and short term goals, and discussed how my life values intersect with my financial realities. I’m now working on some of the saving and budgeting things we talked about, and am about to have my first quarterly update.
I love the broad mission of Community Ladders, and think that their work is so valuable to us younger people who need some advice about how to wisely use money.

Community Ladders is an amazing combination of financial planning and social enterprise. I call it «financial planning for the rest of us» or «financial planning for the 99%». We love that CL is so focused on individual and community empowerment, is willing to take on individuals with the most financial potential but little current income (i.e. students!) and has an incredibly down-​to-​earth financial education bent that will put the most financially illiterate or money curious at ease. Highly recommend their services. Bill is a pleasure to work with, very thorough and patient (you need that when working with people and their money with all its psychological baggage). He is also extremely competent and ever-​learning. Give them a try.