The Next Financial Crisis: What Preppers Should Be Doing Right Now

Is the next financial crisis closer than most people realize? In this episode, Forrest Garvin discusses the warning signs he's watching, the lessons learned from previous financial downturns, and what preppers should be doing right now to strengthen their financial preparedness. From inflation and rising national debt to banking concerns, market volatility, and global economic uncertainty, Forrest explains how these issues could affect everyday families and why preparation is more important than prediction.

You'll learn practical steps to build financial resilience, reduce unnecessary risk, improve your emergency savings, diversify your preparedness strategy, and make smart decisions before a crisis—not during one. Financial preparedness is just as important as food storage, water, and security, and having a plan today can make a tremendous difference tomorrow.

Whether you're new to preparedness or have been preparing for years, this episode will help you think beyond the headlines and focus on practical actions that increase your family's security, freedom, and peace of mind.

Join PrepperNet.Net - https://www.preppernet.net
PrepperNet is an organization of like-minded individuals who believe in personal responsibility, individual freedoms and preparing for disasters of all origins.

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All right, welcome to the Prepping Academy Podcast. I am Forrest. I hope you're having a great day. Or night.com, get all our information. We have a brand new website. Really cool. So preppingacademy.com. So today we're gonna bring, I'm gonna bring one to you, and it's called the Financial Crisis. What preppers should be doing now. The next financial crisis, what preppers should be doing now. And you're like, okay, forest, come on, you're doing all these. Well, you know what? There's so many people that talk about water bottles. Are you I mean, and water filters, and that's important, and I'm gonna do them in the future. Right now, we're talking financial stuff, we're talking, you know, privacy and security. We're talking about things that aren't normally talked about in the prepping world. One of the biggest mistakes I see in the preparedness community today is thinking that every disaster starts with the EMP. Now, it's not true, not every disaster is going to start with the EMP. I mean, sometimes it's just, you know, a storm. A thunderstorm came through. You know, that could be a disaster for you or your community. Many disasters, though, begin with money. And I know for some this could be a little bit uncomfortable. And we're gonna talk about it. Just stay with me. Listen to it in private if you want. That's fine. You know, there's bank failures, there's stock market crashes, there's currency devaluization devaluation, job losses, debt. Most Americans, the next emergency probably won't be an EMP. It probably won't be, you know, a war. It's going to be something to do with money, a job loss, uh, you know, inflation in the economy, something like that. It always begins financially. That's most of our problems for the last 20, 30 years. I mean, what what I mean? Yeah, we had COVID. You know, and we learn from that, and we find out there's a bunch of idiots that we put our trust in. Just stating facts, you know. We were all through that. If you listen, if you listen to the Prepping Academy podcast live, as we went through all that in live real time, we were spot on. We had doctors, we had all these people that we had research analysts, we were talking about Avermectin and hydroxychoricin. Literally, in the beginning, we were so we nailed it. We should get an award for that. I'm just saying, we nailed it. And so, anyway, today we're gonna talk a about what you should be doing now, not out of fear, but out of wisdom to prepare for the next financial crisis in the nation, in your state, in your house. So, meaning your house, not your state's house. So, financial crises aren't they're not rare. They're not, they happen all the dang time. Let me let me throw some at you and see if you recognize these financial crises. You know, you could have gone through some of these, no problem at all, but there are many people that didn't. Depends on how old you are, how old are you? Just say it out loud. No, I'm kidding. The savings and loan crisis. Yeah, okay, that was a minute ago. The dot-com crash, the housing collapse of 2008, the COVID shutdowns, the 40-year high of inflation, the regional bank failures. You know how many banks have failed since Y2K? Not because of Y2K, but the year 2000. Over 530 banks have failed. Thank goodness we have a little insurance, you know. Back in the day, 100 years ago, 115 years ago, they didn't have insurance. Bank failed, they lost all their money. And they failed all the time. So every decade there is something financially going on. There is some so every four to five to ten years, you're gonna be going through some kind of crisis. The detail change. I mean, what is it? It's a you know, it's you know, COVID, it was a health crisis, but it was a financial issue as well. The but the lessons don't change. I need to be ready for whatever comes, even financially. The people who are prepared suffer less. When the pandemic hit, I already had masks, I already had biosuits, I already had, you know, the hand sanitizer, I already had all that stuff. I already had toilet paper. I didn't have to go and fight the Walmart shopping cart wars and get toilet paper. I did we didn't have to do that. I hope you didn't either. And I have a good feeling that since you're here, you probably didn't have to do that. That's being prepared. How many people in your family? Your, you know, come on, your brother, sister, mom and dad. I mean, they're not prepared. They're not, no, not at all. Inflation, though, is this silent disaster. Inflation kills us. Right now we have low inflation, which is good, but one of the hardest disasters to recognize is inflation. Nothing dramatic happens, like boom, inflation. It doesn't happen like that. Instead, groceries just slowly go up, get more expensive. Insurance increases, property taxes increase, utility costs more, restaurants cost more. Have we had a lot of that here recently? Well, we had it during COVID a little bit. Now we had a little bit because of the Iran war, but I believe that's temporary, temporarily, you know, a thing. And to be honest with you, I'm okay with it. Don't misread me. I'm if we can solve this issue quickly and make sure they don't have nukes, I'm okay with a six-month little setback. I I'm just I am. You might not be, and the the difference here might be, I'm not saying it is, that I am more prepared to go through a little bit of inflation than you are, or than some of you. Oh, I can't even pay my gas at so high. Well, maybe you're not truly prepared yet. There's some things we got to work on, and that's what this is about. This hasn't really affected me. I know groceries have gone up, meat's gone up, gas and oil's gone up. It really hasn't affected me that much and a lot of my friends because most of this is a financial situation. We can all still get gas, we can all still get food, it just costs a little bit more. You know, we might be eating out a little bit less because restaurants have gone up as well. So I'll I'll tell you, food's gone up 10.4%. And well, in 1981 was the highest inflation we've ever had, and it went up like 9.1 percent. Food went up that that year in 10%. Energy costs went up 41% in 1981, and gas went up 60%. Okay, that stuff hasn't happened during this thing, but you know, some of this stuff happened during COVID too. Some of the prices went up. So your paycheck may stay the same, but your purchasing power goes down. This is why I encourage people to prepare items before they need it. Buy stuff before you need it. You know, a generator, if we go start going through brownouts because our power grid can't handle these data centers, which I think is a bunch of bull crap myself. You know why? You know why I'm an expert in data centers. Let me just tell you, I'm not an expert in a lot of things. I'm an expert in data centers. And you're going, Force, how can you say that? I mean, how what gives you what makes you an expert? Because in 2000, I created a company called Broadband Avenue, and we literally built from the ground up internet data centers. We built data centers in in five different states. I built data centers. Okay. So Trump even has said, all data centers make your own power. And all of a sudden, people are going, wow, okay. You mean they're gonna make power and put it on the grid? Well, that that becomes less harmful now. And water, you know, the what they use water to cool for coolant and stuff, but guess what? They recycle the water. They probably, I don't know if you guys know, but uh, but a car wash is one of the most effective places that uses water. It literally, your water, your car is washed, it loses like 2% of the water, goes down the drain, they clean it and but and they reuse it again. Data centers do the same thing. So now, if they're not gonna use your power, they're not gonna use your water, what's the problem? I'm gonna tell you the problem. There is a problem. That's not the problem, though. Energy cost is not gonna be the problem, and and using water is not gonna be the problem. It's the problem is they're gonna have a 500,000 square foot data center with six employees. That now, now they'll use uh you know, a thousand employees to build it, but the problem is afterward, people don't even think it about is the data center, you only need like six, maybe I mean, what building in the world is 500,000 square foot or something, and only has six employees to manage it? That's the problem. But it's not really a problem because you know, I don't know if you know this, but the statistic is, and if you don't believe me, go ask AI or look it up. And if you don't believe me, I don't care. But at one time in my life, in the last few years, the saying was everyone in America could live in the state of Texas and have an acre of land. Let that sink in a second. Everyone in America could move to Texas and have almost an acre of land. If that's the case, we're not running out of room, people. Even if it's Texas and we'll throw in Oklahoma, if it takes Oklahoma to make that statement true, we're not running out of land. And if you put that in perspective, going, huh, can you grow enough food on your acre? Yeah, you should be able to. Could there be enough resources? Well, we'd have to do some modifications. Okay, I got off base there. So, so okay, before a storm, a generator costs you know a thousand bucks. During the middle of the storm, it's you know thirteen hundred bucks. You should already have a generator. Don't go buy one. So, how much food? I'll tell you right now, I have a thousand dollars of food in my fridge. Probably a thousand dollars. I'm making that up. I know I have a half cow in there. Well, a half cow minus about 20 mils. We bought a half cow, half cow's expensive. I don't know. Hundreds, six hundred dollars. I don't even know what we paid, to be honest with you. We have a half cow. Mm. I love cow, I love beef. I can't afford for it to spoil if the power goes out. I have generator, I have a backup to a backup. I literally have three generators. I do have a whole house generator, have a backup to my whole house generator, and then I have two like little Honda generators that can still, one of them could run my my freezer. So what if I I'm guessing maybe I'll say between $500 and $1,000 in my freezer. Don't come try to steal it, okay? It's in my it's in my garage, and you know, I got landmines in there, okay? So you could buy a generator before the storm happens with some gas. Gas stores, people are like, gas doesn't store. That's because you don't know how to store it. Look up something called P-R-I-G for gas, P R I D for diesel. They're as stable. Stable's not as good. The red is not as good as the PRI. So P R-I-G for gas, P R-I-D for diesel. Both work great. You can store it for several years. Okay. Get some freeze-dried food. Well, first of all, before you get into freeze-dried food, just double and triple your pantry. If you eat a lot of mac and cheese, buy two months worth of mac and cheese. That's a good ten dollars. Mac and cheese, or what? I don't know, a dollar a box? I have no idea. I don't I shop at Audi, okay? That's our date night. Okay, don't judge me. But we go out to eat, then we go to Audi. Sometimes. But I don't even know how much mac and cheese costs. But let's just say it's a dollar and you you go through five boxes a month, ten boxes a month, just buy extra, double, triple that. Rice, beans, you know, corn, peaches. Oh man. Man. Okay, just let you know it's you know, it's August time frame, and North Carolina and South Carolina has the best peaches in the world. Matter of fact, as soon as this podcast is over, I'm gonna go cut me up a peach. They are the most unbelievable fruit I've ever had in my life. Especially if you can get them fresh like we have. Oh my word, peaches. Okay, sorry. I'm I'm going down these rabbit trails. Don't mean to. So, but then double your pantry, get some extra food, then maybe get some freeze-dried food. Get a month's worth of freeze-dried food. I sell freeze-dried food. Go to prepper net, any of my places, you'll find out I sell it. I I you can buy freeze-dried food from me less than anywhere else in the world. Plain and simple. And it's the legacy, it's the best. I just give you a discount. Get some solar panels, you know, store some money. What? What money? So one of the best things is reduce your debt where times are good. Okay, buy a few things, but also pay off your debt. Debt free is freedom. Let me repeat that. People say, well, some things are good debt. Well, I kind of agree with that, but your house is not good debt. You're not putting that debt and that money somewhere else to make money, you're putting that money to live. So I don't consider a house good debt. Personally, and I'm not a Dave Ramsey, you know, crony either. Just out of debt. And is freedom. If you you most I would say 98% of the people in the world, since they've been like 16, they've never experienced true freedom. And it's sad. So get out of debt every month. Pay, don't just pay the minimums, pay more. Get that debt down. It literally get it down. It is so worth it. What if you lose your job and you're in debt and you gotta pay these credit cards? I have had a car payment. We I own five cars because I have kids, and then I have a property where I have a little truck, but uh our cars are paid for. The last new car we bought. Gosh, I cannot remember the last new car I bought was probably 15 years ago. So if you can imagine, I've been debt-free in cars for I would say at least 10 years. That's insane. I drive the car I want to drive. I drive exactly what I want to. Now one day I'm gonna get the newer model, but I drive a 2012 limited edition 4Runner. It's my favorite car. Yeah, it's paid for for years. So anyway, get out of debt, lose your job. All you need is to cover expenses, monthly expenses. Awesome. If you're ever in that position and all you have to cover is monthly expenses, wow, what a life-changing event. Interest is rising, economy is going slower, debt becomes harder to manage. I'm not saying everyone can just become debt-free overnight. It takes discipline, it takes envelopes. I hate saying that because that's a that's a Ramsey Colt following thing, but you know, we did envelopes, we've done envelopes before, but every payment you eliminate reduces financial stress. Preparedness isn't only about buying more great gear. Just think the great gear you can buy with a peace of mind once you get out of debt. Sometimes it's about owing less money, and that is should be everyone's dream. Matter of fact, I teach a class called Gain Freedom with a home-based business, and it teaches you how to make other income outside of your business. Right now, today, it's never been easier to create your own business and make money. I do have a free webinar. This is not why I did this podcast. It's called Gain Freedom with a Home-Based Business. You can go to Garvin Academy, I'll put it in the notes, and I do a free webinar every month telling you and teaching you things about creating your own business and why. Matter of fact, I say this statement is not directed to you. If you don't have a home-based business, you're an idiot. And the reason I say that is to motivate people to go, well, I don't know what business start. Okay, it doesn't matter. Let's start a business because you can save on taxes. Wait, I can start a business and save on taxes immediately? Yes, you can. That free webinar is once a month. Garvinacademy.com. You can sign up for it. So you can have unexpected bills like medical bills, like air conditioning bills. We just got our air conditioner. What do you call it? They put more freon in it because we wanted it colder, colder. You know, of course, the guy's like, you don't need a new, you need a new system. I'm like, you need a new brain. I'm not getting a new system. And I don't need a new system. He's just trying to sell me. That's what he tells everybody. Car repairs, you know, temporary unemployment. Emergencies just happen. So having money set aside can help you overcome many crises in your life. Even starting with a goal of one month expenses, you put aside. Take one month of pay, put it aside. And you've heard that many times. Many people don't do it. Then start a home-based business. That's the ticket to freedom, people. Because sometimes you just can't work enough hours to get out of debt. What you can do is work for yourself and make more money. And literally, you will work more hours, but you're working for yourself and you're getting paid more. Okay. So it's just do it one step at a time. Don't go nuts. Preparedness has always been about avoiding a single point. Of failure. And finances, a lot of time, is a single point of failure for people. And that especially finances. So don't rely on one source of income. Yes, get a home-based business, start it. It's easy. You can make money, you can save on taxes. Don't rely on one finance institution. Don't think about multiple income streams. That's what rich people do. Okay, I could work for my W-2, but what can I do on the weekend or night to make more money? Home-based business, do consulting, sell products, maybe buy some rental income. Don't do it, it's gonna get you more in debt, I guess. And investments. Investments right now also teach you crypto kick lawyers, of course. That didn't sound right. But a crypto, I think crypto is going to be big. My free webinar on crypto, it literally is it's called the case for crypto. I teach people, hey, crypto is not coming, it's here, and you just don't know about it. So, what skills can produce an income? The more money comes your way, the better resilient your household is. And that's your job as a mom and a dad is for your house to be resilient and be able to get through things easy. And it and that's why we prepare. And we need to be redundant on the things income. Maybe you and your wife were like, We got two incomes. Well, okay, do another one together, separate, and get more money. Money covers it, money doesn't buy you happiness, it does buy you security. I'm just saying, a lot of times, and I just made that up, so don't hang me for that. So invest in skills. Okay, what skills? I need to take a ham class, okay. The ham classes are usually free, actually. I need to take a survival class, okay. I have a survival school, Carolina Preparedness.com. We teach all kinds of skills and stuff, but get better prepared knowledge, learn to garden, you know, learn first aid, communication, woodworking, mechanics, learn how to preserve food, learn about privacy and security. Hey, I teach about that. Learn how to start a home-based business, teach about that. Skills stay with you no matter what the economy, no matter if you lose your job or not, you have your skills. Skills are yours and can't be taken away from you. I guess they could just kill you, but that would be bad. That's not gonna happen. Didn't mean to go all morbid on you right there. But the next financial crisis is gonna come. It will come. Be ready, reduce your debt, build a savings, develop skills, diversify your income, buy important things in the timeline that you need. You don't need thermal vision goggles right now when you can't you don't have a what month's worth of food. I wrote a great book. It's called The Preparedness Roadmap, and it takes you through the buying that you need to buy. When to buy it, what skills you need, what books you need to read, what movies you need to watch over a year period of time. Do it in an order. Literally, these were my first podcasts, created this book, and I interviewed all these people and they go, I said, What should you do first? People say, Well, you should have food. Okay, food. We need to work on food on month number one. You should have thermal vision goggles. When should you buy that? Oh, maybe after you have this, this, this, this, this, this, and five years worth of you know, resources. I'm like, oh, okay. So that's down, yeah. So I put them in in order, things you need to buy, skills you need, books you need to read, movies you need to watch. That's for mindset. Mindset's important, and I put it in a book, and it's called The Preparedness Roadmap. And you can buy it on forestgarvin.com on most of my websites. You could probably find it. I don't know. You can go to Amazon, and that's force with two R's. My mom could afford both of them, and I can run. Anyway, I had to make fun, I have to make fun of myself because that movie. So the history says that financial issues are coming. They come every five to ten years. They just come. And the more you are prepared financially and out of debt, the it might not even be a situation at that point. That is great if it's not a situation. So for financial preparedness isn't separate from emergency preparedness, it's not, it's all a part of the same thing. So, anyway, I just wanted to share this, guys, with you. One, because I've been helping family with their finances, starting their own home-based business, and and it it makes a huge difference. And I just wanted to share that with you guys. So, anyway, I'll put a lot of that information in the comments about the free webinar, about my book, all that stuff. You can find it all in there. Sure, it's probably there anyway. So, anyway, I just wanted to share that. Was it, guys? Hope you guys have a great day, great week. Hey, like, subscribe, share this with every email you have. I'm kidding, don't do that. People think you're weird. But anyway, thanks for joining us, and you guys, God bless, and you guys have a great week. Take care.

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