MONEY DIARIES: The Student Smashing her Savings, Side Hustle & Investment Goals!

Hello, my name's Santasha Nabananga Bamblet. I'm a proud yr

Let's get into it.

She's on the Money, She's on the Money. Hello, and welcome to She's the Money, the podcast for millennials who want financial freedom. Welcome back to another one of our Money Diarius episodes where I get the absolute privilege of talking to one of our beautiful She's on the Money community members all about their journey. Let's jump straight into it, because this week I got a message and it went

Twenty thousand dollars and I've invested six three hundred dollars.

I'm a university student, work as a school learning support officer, and own a tutoring business partnership with my sisters. I'd love to share my journey with the Shees on the money community. Ah, money Diarist, you're eighteen, twenty thousand dollars in savings, just got.

Like a killer little business on the side. Welcome to the show.

Thank you for having me.

Are you very joking?

This is so cool? No, it's my life. I can't believe it.

Yeah, this is very cool. I'm very proud of you already. I cannot wait to learn more about you. So let's just dive straight in. The first question I always ask our diarist is money Diarist, can you let me know, on a scale of A through to F what you think your money habits would be?

Right now, I would thank myself for bee because I do feel like for my age, I've done a really good job. I do feel like I have really good habits and good cash flow. But I do think these areas of improvement.

All right, I kind of believe you.

But also, you're eighteen and have twenty thousand dollars in savings and I'm like, okay, like a bee's probably not enough.

But let's get into it.

My favorite question of all time to ask not just money diarists, but literally anyone. Let's go money diarist. Can you tell me more about your money story?

So, as I mentioned, I grew up in a single parent household. My parents flew when I was ten months old, and although my dad did pay child support, it's still not much. We did have to live quite frugally and we definitely live within our means. Yeah, my mum, she was very good at managing money. It was always her priority to pay off the mortgage, and as mentioned, she really put our education first. We always had money for school excursions or for camp or for tutoring.

As I love her.

I got into the lady years of high school.

Yeah, I love her. What a little queen and she's like, nah, I don't need a man.

Literally, but yeah, she's done an amazing job.

And through that she really did show all of us amazing money habits, especially how important it is to have at your own job or your own money. I have two older sisters and they started getting a job and earning their own money when they were fourteen, and I was like, I want this, I won't have my own money. And then they started saving for a car and that was just my big goal in high school. So I say, fifteen thousand dollars for my first car.

Wait, so you also own a car and you're eighteen, and on top of that, you have the twenty thousand dollars and then you're also an investor.

Yes.

Here I am.

Thinking like, oh, I'm going to ask her, like, is she going to buy a car with like her first twenty thousand dollars?

No, no, she doesn't need us guys.

No? Yeah, so I did buy my car.

But then at the end of high school, after I bought my car, I've only had a thousand dollars left. So I started off last year with a thousand dollars.

So you've saved like nineteen thousand dollars in a year. Yes, all right, we're going to need to learn a lot from you, but yes, carry on, Okay.

It's always been a big focus for me throughout high school. Somehow I stumbled across YouTube videos how to get rich to about investing, and I was like, what is this. I need to get into this, And then I found your podcast. I started reading different books, so yeah, that's how I really started investing as well.

Welcome to the community. I love that you're here.

Thank you.

So you've got twenty thousand dollars, Like that's your money story so far, but like, where's it going?

Okay?

The plan is this June, I'm going to Europe and there goes a lot of that money, but.

That's okay, that's what it was allocated.

For, and traveling to me is a priority. I really want to make the most about why I can. And then I do have five thousand dollars in an emergency fund, so that won't.

Be touched in addition to all of that.

No, no, no, sorry, twelve thousand for travel, five thousand in an emergency.

Great, how cool. I love that you've already like you're eighteen and you have an emergency fund. Are you joking?

No? It was the first thing I did. I was like, VI said, I have to have one, fib I've got to get one.

I love this so much. I'm obsessed.

And I just love that you're eighteen and have a five thousand dollar emergency fund because that's something that so many people just don't have. And like I know, having spoken to the community, I've you know, just finished up my online course Your Best Year Yet, And you know, that was a really interactive course where I like got to talk to a lot of people about you know, what are you going to smash out this year? Like what are your goals that we actually have to achieve?

Oh it's honestly because of you. I've learned so much from you.

You are way too kind, all right, tell me more. I want to know more about your work. What do you do for work and how much money do you earn?

I work as a school learning support officer, so I am contracted three days a week by pick up casual days when I can. So last year I earned twenty thousand dollars after tax.

Wait, you earned twenty thousand dollars after tax. But earlier in the show we learned that you saved nineteen thousand dollars last year.

Well, then we'll get to my business. I saw hustle.

I was about to say, who is a little queen when it comes to saving?

No?

So then I also have my tutoring business that I have with my sisters, and I earned the same so twenty thousand dollars. I don't pay pay as you go tax, so I will have to pay some tax at tax time.

Yeah, and what does that actually look like day to day? And how did you start this tutoring business?

We were just sitting at the dinner table one night and there's.

So many people on Facebook that will say does anyone know a tutor?

And my mum just said, why don't you girls start something?

So a few months later we got our ABN and then on Facebook we just started replying to people saying, oh, we have a tutoring business.

We'd love to cheotor you. So I actually started this.

When I was fifteen with them just a baby. It's crazy because at the time I didn't feel young, Like I look back like fifteen is very young. I didn't feel like that. And then now we have a tutor who works for.

Us as well.

Oh how cool.

Yes, it is amazing. We just have a big Google drive.

We've been doing it for four years now, so we just have a lot of resources, a lot of worksheet booklet so just over time we built it up as well.

How cool.

And you guys just tutor in the subject areas that you kind of excell in or like what does that look like?

How did you go? All right?

You know, I'm a pretty smart girl. I'm willing to teach others, especially so young. Was that a very big Oh? Actually no, I'm really good at this.

So we were like, oh, so I actually always had tutored primary school kids. When I was in high school, I tewed Eddy two D six and then I did very well in my final school exams, so I started tutoring high school students as well. So I tutor year seven to twelve English and maths. And really, for example, although I focus on English and maths, if one of my students needs help, for example, on a woodwork assignment, and it's like a theory of that, we'll just do that.

Yeah, of course, because it's not necessarily about you know, being a genius at that topic, but rather helping somebody learn their course work.

Right.

Absolutely.

I did a bit of tutoring when I was at UNI, and I loved it. I just always thought it was really fun.

Yeah, And a big misconception is I would say that it's not about doing the work for them, it's guiding them and equipping them with the skills to do the work.

Yeah, Adore, what's going to happen to the business? Obviously, you're only eighteen, you're planning on traveling, and I'm assuming you're studying. Yes, what's going to happen to the business in the future.

Well, right now, I do work one day to first day, every afternoon tutoring, and then when I travel, two weeks is over school holidays, two weeks is during school term, so I just let them know that I can't tuator those two weeks. But the plan is when I finish my degree to continue tutoring. But if I do feel like it's too much, or you know, I don't have a good work life balance, I can always reduce the amount of students I tutor.

Yeah, so tell me that was a grand assumption. I was like, she's pretty smart, she's got a tutoring business. I think she's probably studying still herself.

What are you studying? What do you want to be when you grow up?

I'm studying to be primary school teacher.

Of course, you are perfect fit.

Yes, and that's why I work in school as well, because it just goes so well.

And then I want to be a primary school teacher.

We're going to keep this tutoring business on the side with your employees in it or I hope.

So I love this, Thank you.

Hopefully one day I could be some sort of executive in school, do you know, curriculum advice or being an ap.

Oh, you're going to be the principal. It's all good. You're going to run this town. I love it.

Tell me, now, what are your big money goals? What are you currently working towards.

My big money goal is to continue investing. I would love to have maybe twenty thousand dollars invested by the time I graduate YEAP and while I'm in UNI continuing to save to travel. In about eighteen months, I'm going to be able to actually casually teach, so that means I get more money, which means I could probably start saving for an investment property.

Ah, investment property. Yeah, you've already got your eyes on the price.

Yes, I do live in Sydney, so it does feel unattainable to probably buy in Sydney, so I would buy out of state, but just something maybe with a smaller mortgage I could afford.

One hundred percent.

And you've probably listened to a heap of money dies where you know that's possible. Like I think when you're young and you don't have access to content like we create on cheese on the money, you make automatic assumptions. You're like, well, I live in Sydney and Sydney's really expensive, therefore I can't afford property. And it's like, well, actually we just need to be a little bit creative. We

Initially, I just thought I'd just purchased a fairly home that i'd live in. And then I heard about rent vesting, where you buy elsewhere but you rent sort of in the suburb you want to live, and I think that is a bit more attainable than buy like a one point something million dollar house in Sydney.

Yeah, so it's definitely has changed.

It's a little bit more approachable, and I think, you know, in twenty twenty four, we need to be remembering that it's not the same as the eighties or the nineties, Like you can no longer just go and buy your

Absolutely.

I want to ask a little bit more about this travel.

Right, So you haven't traveled extensively yet because you're just a baby.

How have you started to budget for.

Travel so obviously having not done it yet, where are you researching?

What are you doing?

Like in our community, there are so many questions about how do I you know, look up flights or this all that?

You know?

What's it going to cost me?

You said Europe? Europe can be really expensive? My friend tell me, because I feel like you're going to be structured in this.

Yes.

So actually during COVID, during our long lockdown, I was like, oh, I want to do travel. So I planned out a whole year of this imaginary trip.

No you didn't, Yes, I did.

And it's so.

Sad to look back on because surprises were so cheap. You could get a hostel of like thirty dollars a night. Yeah, so budgeting for this trip my sister does live in

Yeah, Elite, I love that you've got it planned. And the other thing that I love is that you have an emergency fund going over there, so even if you do get into a pickle, you're going to be okay.

Yeah, and we also have to budget for travel insurance.

Very very nice.

I was about to ask you about investment, but I'm going to save that for after the break. So let's go to a really quick break. And on the flip side, I want to know your investing plan, because you did say you want to invest twenty thousand dollars by the time you've graduated. I think I graduated with debts, so

Are you going to do that? What does that look like? And have you got a plan?

So last year I used the snowballs strategy, just doing one.

Saving scot at a time, yep. But this year I'm going to do a little bit differently.

I don't know what it's called, but you just put money aside every single pay So that's what I'll do. And I just put as much as I can every pay aside for investing, and then every time it reaches five hundred or one thousand, I'll invest. I really like ETF. Currently I'm in ASX two hundred, but there's two, Like there's one stock that's like seven thousand dollars per stock, but there's another ASEX one that is like sixty something per stock, so I'm in the smaller one, and then

So tell me about how you came up with splitting your investment that you currently have between the ASX top two hundred and an agricultural ETF. Like, where did that thought pattern come from? Like, yeah, tell me more.

I really knew it was important to have diversified stocks.

So although the top two.

Hundred stocks or he has diversity, I wanted something different as well, which has worked out well because at times the ASEX one has dropped, the agriculture one has gone up, and vice versa.

Isn't it fun to watch when you start to learn, No, it's not fun. I think it's fun because you kind of feel valid in the choice that you make.

Right, so you've obviously diversified, and.

You're like, ah, I see why, Like I did that, and I feel good when you know.

It's obviously not a good feeling when your ETF is down. No one likes that. Don't get me wrong.

Oh I'm meant to be like really good at money, but I still look at my portfolio and if it's down, I'm like ill, David like no, Ill, Like I don't like it either. But it's nice to see your whole portfolio and go, oh, that is down, but all that one's doing well and all balances out. That's why we do diversification.

Absolutely.

How do you learn about diversification at eighteen though, like sis, I don't get it. Like at eighteen, if you'd said diversification, I'd be like who, I didn't even know how to spell that.

It was honestly through your book, especially even when you talked about investing the same amount at different times, Like just through your book.

She's dolo cost averaging, she's investing, and guys, she still thinks she's b So we're gonna have a fight at the end.

But that's all right. I love a little bit of a morning argument. I want to know, I know the answer to this. Put us on the list of questions, my love, Do you have any debt? If so, what is it?

Yes, I have about four thousand dollars in my hex step.

That's not an exact amount, just a guess, but yeah, about four thousand dollars.

And how much do you think that's going to go up by for the study that you're doing.

I think by the time I graduated to be about sixteen to twenty grand.

And do you have a plan for that or is that something that you're going to let tick along? Have you thought about it?

I'm just gonna let it tick along because historically it hasn't indexed a lot, so I just think I could actually make more money investing it somewhere else.

Yah, smart cookie.

When you say it hasn't indexed a lot, but last year it indexed at seven point one percent, how are you coming to that conclusion? Are you going oh over the long term? And how did you learn to think like that? Because like nobody thinks like that. Everyone freaks out that it was seven point one percent last year.

I think last year a lot of things in the moning world were very different. For example, stocks went down, the index went up. I just think perhaps it could be one or two year off. Maybe it won't be like that every year.

All Right, she's a genius, guys, give it what three or four years, and I'll be out of a job. At She's on the money and this money diarist will be in. So I'm just going to make what I can for the next few years. Before you take over my world, I want to know you probably have a million of them.

What are your best money habits?

My best money habit is when I get paid.

I have a purpose for every single dollar. Everywhere has a place to be, yes, Queen, and I do get paid a regular announts because if I pick up casual work or maybe one week, five of my tutoring students are sick. I just have a system that really works for that.

Yeah, okay, And how did you learn to cash flow? Is this something that you've always done? Did your mom teach you?

Like?

What does this look like?

I actually have heard my own and pop always say say first, then spend. I actually don't really know where I learned. I think I just looked at what are my main goals? How much would I need to save every week to get there? And then it just had a domino face.

Any other good money habits you'd like to share with.

Us, I'm very good at delayed gratification. For example, there were shoes I looked at for two years before I purchase them two years.

Yes, they even keep them in stock after two years.

Yes they do, but they actually went up a little bit. I'm like, I should actually just brought them to start with.

What shoes are these? Because like we need to know, I'm a shree girley.

Okay, they were Nike Jordans.

That's a thing.

At the moment, I can't get into it because I am an elder millennial. You see like, I'm just not cool enough, and if I put them on, you guys would be like, Victoria Devine, take those off right now?

You are not cool? But I get it.

I have a nephew who is obsessed with air Jordans. Are you now a collector?

No?

I have two pairs and I don't really wear them that much now. I actually prefer sandals, which is a complete.

Opposite, but it still sparks joy.

So we're gonna leave it in the positive money habits section exactly right now.

Tell me about your worst money habits. What do you think they?

I would actually say I have a lot of guilt around spending money because I just think money spent is money that's not saved.

Why where's this coming from.

I think I.

Did grow up quite frugally and really we just have what we needed. So showed me that I don't need to have a lot of things.

That's absolutely fair. I want to know a little bit more around this mindset thing. Everyone's listening and they're just like, holy guacamole, this girl has her head screwed on.

Right. You're eighteen.

You grew up in a single parent household, which is honestly so inspirational, like single moms do not get the credit that they deserve. And the fact that you're like mum put out education first, Like you've obviously got siblings, so your mum wasn't even just one kid, there were three of you. Is that right?

Yes, there is.

This queen has taught you how to save, how to like, you know, get on the right track. She empowered you to start your business at fifteen, Like I want this queen on the show, like I want to literally and maybe if you guys are listening, not just money darrest, if your mum wants to come on the show and she now has adult kids that are in the she's on the money community, we want to hear from them.

For her kids the entire time.

Anyway, side note, the last thing I want to talk to you about is your bee, you said at the start of this episode, and like now you've probably heard yourself when we've talked about this. I don't think many people are going to go, oh, this money darist is definitely a bee. She's obviously killing it and she's just a baby. Oh think you tell me what it would take to get you to an A plus, Like, what does that actually look like?

I think the biggest thing it would take is really thinking before I Apple paid so easy to just tap. I think that's the biggest thing, really thinking.

Do I feel like this eight dollar coffee?

Yes?

I do.

I know I always like the eight dollar coffee.

It's a slippery slope, isn't it. But like, at the end of the day, the show is about values, but your coffee, I promise, is not putting you in a position where you're a b So you're gonna have to justify it further.

I'm really sorry, what makes you a b?

Ah?

I'm on the spot now. I don't even know what to say.

One hundred percent.

You can't come on this show be like, Hey, by the way, I'm actually a legend. I'm eighteen, I've you know, saved twenty grand I've invested sixy three hundred.

I have this really great plan to go to Europe in July.

I'm gonna have like the best time my mom and I are going.

I've done all my budget.

By the way, when it comes to investing, I'm really well diversified, and I fully comprehend that.

Also fully understand my hex And here's why I'm not paying it off.

Like you are saying things that people in their fifties are still like, Oh, I haven't wrapped my head around that concept yet. And that's fine because we're all on our different journeys, right, But like, there are gonna be some people who are like this girl's got a few rocks in her head. If she thinks she's a bee, you're definitely an A to them. So what are the things that you have to change to in your own mind?

Get to that A?

Plus?

What does that look like?

Probably just really thinking do I really want to buy this?

Do I need this? But when you put it like that, does like I could be an a.

You're like, oh yeah, actually nah, yes.

But you know what you did remind me of two things. Since I put the submission in, i'd have invested another thousand dollars and I have three thousand, three hundred and super.

I am very proud of you. I cannot believe it.

And I keep being like you're just a baby, because at the moment, you would not feel that way.

You'd just be like, I'm an adult, victoria, like sit down.

But I look back at myself at eighteen, and I go, holy moly, she was so young, like in the most beautiful way, like not in a your naive you don't know what's coming away, but more in like a you're so young, you're so optimistic, you have so much life ahead of you, like, and the fact that you're in this position just means everything in adulthood is going to be turbocharged. I'm obsessed, but I look at it and I go, I'm so proud of who you are but

And be like, what a queen. We love her, Like, give me three or four years, please come back.

We need to do an updated money diary, which is something I've been looking at because we all want to check in, like.

You're active in the community.

We obviously let you be anonymous on the show so we can get real pervy.

But thank you for this.

I have adored talking to you, and I just know that our community is going to listen to this and be like, what a queen get it?

Ah, thank you so much for Troy. I love being on the show.

Oh my gosh, no, thank you so much. It has been an absolute pleasure.

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