I’m Joey Lipp, and I create useful things for a free & virtuous society. I’m a financial advisor, professor, and entrepreneur.

At my heart, I’m simply a student of timeless wisdom. I endeavor to put that wisdom in action in my own work and to teach others that wisdom with my life. There you have it.

I aim to live a life of both contemplation and action, a life of thinking AND acting. I put wisdom to work, and see no separation between things that most people consider entirely different: philosophy and finances, for example, or wisdom and work.

In fact, the things that most people consider merely “practical” (like budgeting, choosing a career, and investing) are enormously enhanced when bolstered underneath by beautiful ideals.

Why? Because ideals have consequences. Ideals become things, and work is how we materialize our ideals, not just how we get paid.

In the first phase of my adult life I thought I was going to be a pastor. Long story short, instead, I earned a PhD in classics, with emphases on ancient Biblical and Greco-Roman religions and philosophical literature, and was a classics faculty member, first at The Ohio State University (2008—2018) and then (still) at Monmouth University.

My wife and I experienced a money revolution in our household in the early 2000 teens, prompting us to dream big about being debt free and building wealth. We sold everything that wasn’t nailed down, worked our tails off to kill our debt, and got free. In May 2024, we purchased a home in Ocean Grove, New Jersey with an ocean view without credit scores. Yes, we had been debt free for so long that we didn’t have credit scores, so we found a local bank willing to do manual underwriting.

Take heart, my friend: Freedom is possible, especially when it seems impossible.

Somewhere along the way I built a business from scratch (Odyssey Coffee) with no formal business training (but lots of timeless wisdom), and found that I was quite good at it. At the same time I began informally coaching people on their finances.

When higher ed began violently to implode post-2020 in all but the most niche recesses of the American republic (such as Hillsdale College), I started to think hard about where I wanted to point my teaching efforts going forward.

I wondered: Where can I best love and serve others with my passion for timeless wisdom, freedom, and virtue, and at the same time do my part to ensure the flourishing of my country’s citizens?

The answer looked like this:

1. Philosophy Professor + Business + Money Wisdom = Financial Advisor.

2. Financial Advisor + American Citizen = Freedom Quest.

At Freedom Quest we see an America where its citizens are debt free and building so much private wealth that social security is simply irrelevant for all but the poorest of our neighbors.

I am so excited to serve you and your family, and in the meantime serve our country!

Since you’ll see a lot of talk on this site about “ideals” and Freedom Quest’s motto is Discover your ideals & flourish in freedom, I’ll go ahead and share with you my top four personal ideals:

1. to grow in intimacy with God

2. to grow in love and service of others

3. to grow in the intellectual virtues

4. to grow in the ethical virtues

Elsewhere in life I have been married to Shanna since 2004. She’s directed the summer children’s programs for the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association since 2003, and she’s the principal at Ambassador Christian Academy in Allenwood, New Jersey. We have four beautiful boys: Alastair (who died in 2005), Isaac (born in 2008), Hayden (born in 2010), and Eli (born in 2012). We live and give in Ocean Grove, New Jersey.

I can’t wait to hear your story and to be a part of your family’s quest for freedom.

The first thing we’ll do together is sit down and discover your highest ideals. Then we’ll craft a lifetime plan to materialize those ideals in your work, your finances, and your contribution to our free & virtuous society.

To that end I work.

~ Joey