Founded in 2014, BCL’s Community Loan Centers of Austin and Dallas are financial wellness programs offered as an employee benefit through employers like Parkland Hospital, United Way of Greater Austin, the Cities of Austin, Dallas, and Wilmer, and more.

While best known for its affordable lending program, the mission of Community Loan Centers is to promote overall financial wellness, which we achieve with no-cost financial wellness classes and coaching for all employees. As we work to advance the mission of financial wellness for all employees, the Community Loan Center partnered with the City of Austin to offer Money Moves, our signature 6-week financial coaching program featuring group classes and one-on-one sessions with a personal financial coach.

BCL of Texas Money Move$ program is an in-depth financial empowerment program that helps participants identify, explore and shape a personal financial power plan by teaching key and practical financial concepts to help achieve a fundamental change in personal financial management. Consisting of four workshops and three individualized one-on-one Financial Coaching sessions, this cohort style program builds upon each subsequent workshop, resulting in each participant submitting a final Financial Power Plan they commit to following for the remainder of the year.

Our Money Move$ pilot with the City of Austin produced profound changes in the financial well-being of the 15 participants, including:

• An overall debt reduction of over $15,000 for the entire cohort
• 5 credit cards paid off
• 4 payday loans paid off
• 20% of participants improved their credit score in 6 weeks
• Average credit score increase of 42 points

Money Moves Testimonial
Pilot participant Danny Madison said:

Prior to starting the 6-week “Money Moves” program, I had created a budget to help me track my payments and budget, but each month I would still fall short and wasn’t noticing any changes in my savings. 

Within the first week of the Money Moves program I was able to determine why I wasn’t seeing the changes in my savings like I should have…I was over spending on gift giving. After attending virtual courses with Cruz, and having my one-on-one with Pam, I was able to identify my spending problems and learned how to overcome them. 

During the Money Moves program I was able to pay off 2 of my payday loans, as well as one of my credit cards. In addition, I was able to save a little over $200. To some this may not be much but for me this is a great start!