Hello, my name's Santasha Nabananga Bamblet. I'm a proud Order
Order Kerney Whoalbury and a waddery woman. And before we get started on She's on the Money podcast, I would like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land of which this podcast is recorded on a wondery country, acknowledging the elders, the ancestors and the next generation coming through as this podcast is about connecting, empowering, knowledge sharing and the storytelling of you to make a difference for today and lasting impact for tomorrow.
Let's get into it.
She's on the Money, She's on the Money.
Hello, and welcome to She's on the Money Podcast Millennials who want financial freedom. My friends, welcome back to another one of our money diaries where I get the absolute pleasure of sitting down and talking to one of our incredible She's on the Money community members all about their money story. Let's jump straight into it, because this week I got an email and it sounded exactly like this
high She's on the Money team. I've always been driven, and buying my first property at twenty two felt like my biggest achievement. But that excitement quickly turned into regret when I realized my rental property manager and strata, both from the same company, were mismanaging everything. The stress was overwhelming and I nearly sold the property at a loss. It took a lot of persistence, but I fought to get a new strata management company to take over, and
it finally paid off. Now I'm gearing up to renovate the property so it can become the rental I've always envisioned. I've also leveraged the equity from this property to put a deposit on a new home on the Central Coast since knee prices are completely out of reach. With the settlement just around the corner, I'm so excited to start this new journey with my fiance Money Diarist. That's so exciting, but also like so stressful. I feel like I've been talking to so many people over the last few weeks
about strata and how painful it can be. Are you for or against strata at this point?
Oh, I'm full against it. Anybody in real estate, Like, like, when I meet them, the first thing is they put a wall up because of all the issues in the past, So I feel bad, but like, yeah, I would say again.
I'm not in real estate weekend hangout. I'm like, I am kind of in property. I suppose I'm in mortgage broking.
So like, oh no, that's okay. I love my mortgage broker.
He's awesome, right, yeah, okay, all right, yeah, we love mortgage brokers. All right, on the same page. Let's start the way that I always start money, Diris, Before I get into the nitty gritty, can you let me know what grade you would give your money habits if I asked you to give them a grade from eight through to F.
At the moment, I think I would give myself a solid.
Bee solid be all right, Well, let's learn more about that money dice. Can you tell me a little bit more about your money story.
So my money story obviously started around my parents. They were very hard workers when I was young. I learned from them that if you want to be wealthy or have money, then you have to put hard work in to get there. Like, for example, my dad was a sole trader and he would leave the house before I even woke up, and then in the afternoon when I finished dancing late at night, I would have to walk over to his work and wait till about eleven o'clock before I could go home.
So, oh my gosh, eleven. As a kid, you would have been exhausted at school the next day.
Oh, I would sleep in the truck and then just yeah, go home. And he would repeat it every day too, So like seeing how much hours he put in, then that sort of trigging in my mind like hard work means wealth. So and then mum was the same. Mum would do all the business admin for him and was the bookkeeper. But then she's working full time and managing a household with my brother and I. So yeah, so seeing all the hours that she put in, Oh.
What a queen. We love that.
Yeah. So there was always those conversations around the house like oh, you can't, please, don't take any more work from this person. The invoice haven't been paid, or if we want that machinery, we've got to wait for xyz. Like there wasn't any conversations that were ever struggling, but it's just they were around the kitchen, never at the table or anything. But yeah, I just off heard dose.
I was never really involved, but yeah, hearing that kind of set in a little bit of like financial literacy there. Even though I didn't really pay attention.
Yeah, but I feel like these conscious or unconscious conversations kind of become part of the narrative. You kind of go, okay, well I know what they're talking about, Like, you know, it's like your parents' family friends, Like I'm not friends with them, but I know lots about them because Mum will be like, oh, such and such jit X y Z over the week, and like you remember from all the other conversations you've had, who that person is, who their kids are, what that looks like, like you're starting
to put puzzle pieces together. What was it like hearing conversations about business as a kid, So, you know, coming home and maybe mum and dad are like, don't accept any more work from you know, Sharon because she didn't pay her invoice. Like were you stressed by that because you were like, oh my gosh, invoices aren't getting paid? Or were you like get it, mum, you show them the boundary, Like what did that look like?
It probably was more like get it, mum, because my dad's more of a joke star. If he's not happy with something and then he makes a joke, it's like, oh he accepts me now, or whatnot. So like every time Mum would say something and put a foot down, he would crack a joke and it would be more of like a laughing situation than or you need to
be serious and get this sorted. So yeah, it was more funny, but I think it kind of set in sewn, like finances behind me and saving and like Mum would be like, oh, no, you can't talk to me today because it's business day and I have to get stuff sorted, so like you learn the hard line, and also just made me really driven because I see how hard that
day work. And then when I've got my first job, I was like, oh, well, Mum and Dad are working like this, so that's set a standard, so then I should be working like that too, or I should be having those conversations.
And how young were you?
Oh Dad had his business before I can even remember. I don't remember him in any other job except for business, so I would have been really young. I remember my first couple of times when I was in school, so like maybe kindergarten, primary school, I was hearing these conversations.
Yeah, which is kind of cool, and it's also I mean, very relevant for me at the moment because I'm in the middle of I have a six month old. I'm seeing all these conversations about you know, daycare and about you know, working parents versus being able to be a stay at home parent. And obviously we're all out here just doing the best that we can. But I'm quite clearly a working parent. But then you get a little bit of anxiety. You're like, am I doing the right thing?
Like when I drop Harvey off at daycare? Like this morning I dropped him off at daycare. He looked like he was having the best time ever. He saw his like room leader, and he's little face lit up and was like, oh, heck, yeah, what a good day.
This is probably more fun than home.
Oh my gosh. Yeah, Like genuinely, they are going to be teaching him more and giving him more activities than I could ever do. But you kind of go, am I doing the right thing? So, as a child of you know, very hard working parents, do you think that that was a positive or a negative thing? That mom and dad were going to work and drawing boundaries and saying no money, dorist, don't talk to us today. We've you know, got to crack the whip on the business today.
I've got to get you know, all this admin out or was that something that you're like, oh, I'm a little bit resentful because I want to ask these questions when it's anonymous.
Yeah, I mean it depends on the time. Because when I was young, like, there were times when Mum treated me like a like a business, like, for example, you would love this. Actually, when I started my first job, she put like a hard line in and I joke about it and I say, oh, she cut me off, but really she didn't. It was just if you want anything, you pay for it. If you need anything, you'll support you through it.
And so see, I think that's good parenting. But I can also see that when you were probably what like fourteen or fifteen, you were like, that's a joke. I hate it here exactly.
And that's why I'm like, I was so resentful for it because I went to a private Catholic school and all my friends.
Again you're given everything, yeah, and.
I'm there having to like work hard for Like I know at the time, I was so resentful for it, and I'm so grateful now, but yeah, like there were times where she treated me like she was a tax agent, like if I didn't pay my board. She would send me a text message like a tax person, and I'm like, mom, like my mother, like my friends laugh at the messages. So at the time I was very resentful. Now I'm like, no, she was just teaching me a really hard lesson and it really has paid off.
And do you have siblings, Is this the same kind of situation for them?
Yes? I have an older brother. He's very savvy, like I've never seen him do an assignment in his life, and he got first in all of his subjects at school, so like he's just very special.
On Why is it always like that so rude?
Yeah, and that had caused a little tension between us, Like he always thought that I got things that he didn't get. So yeah, I believe Mum did the same for him. He actually, I think he got it at some points a little bit harder, like once he got a full time job, the board came before I did. I got to negotiate a little bit.
I see. I feel like that second child privilege, like my sister and I reminis on things that like my parents were like absolutely not Victoria Devine and then Alex would be like can I do this? And mom and dad be like sure, I'd be like what.
I was like, No, I don't have a full paying, full time job yet you can't pay me board, Like, oh, I can't pay for you.
Were just negotiating this. Yeah, I like it. I mean that's a good skill to develop very early. So I guess now you're an adult, you're twenty nine years old. What do you do for work? And how much money do you earn?
Now, I work at a local council in town planning, and I'm on around ninety five k, well very much a year. And then if you count the rental income from my investment, that's around twenty three k a year.
Excuse me, that's very cool, isn't it? Twenty three grand a year? In I would assume passive income. I'm going to ask about debt later. But you then paying your mortgage and stuff or is that like a twenty three clean.
Twenty three before management fees come out in the mortgage as well? So yeah, I haven't factored that in.
And is it positive or negatively yeared?
I believe I'm still negative. I've only been positive once and that was during COVID when the interest rates were so low.
Yeah, that was a good time. To have a mortgage honestly, like I remember we got ours during that period of time, and I don't know, but I would like to think that I'm relatively financially literate, so I should have seen this coming. But I got my first mortgage and I was like, this is easier than I thought it would be. And then obviously the economy recovered and my mortgage did not, and I was like, wow, what a surprise. Why didn't I see that coming?
Yeah, And I was like mine, I got it another high and then it went to a low. And then when it go into a high, and I was like, oh my god, how did I do this? Before?
I know? All right, So I want to know more. You obviously already have a property. You mentioned in your diary in that you have a fiance. Tell me a little bit about your big money goals. What are you currently working towards.
I actually had to write this down because the last year, with all the stress from the rental property, like, our money goals have changed so much, Like because I got to a point where I was like, my goal was to sell the property.
Yeah, because you were like just done.
Yeah, I was just done. And I went to a financial advisor to crunch the numbers for me because I thought I was be at a loss. But then I wasn't happy with the financial advice because I wanted to see data. I wanted to see those datas so I could make that decision. So yeah, but moment our goal is to get the investment property into a condition where it just functions in the background and I can actually put the rent up to market value because I've kept
it quite low because of the condition. I felt so bad. I'm like, I couldn't put the rent up and they're living in that state. I was like, not fair.
But that's really nice of you to not absolutely take the mickey, because I feel like a lot of landlords at this point in time are just going, well, market's paying this, either pay it or ship out. Someone else will pay the rent. And I feel like that's a really awful way to do things. But why did you do that? Is that just your morals and your ethics or where does this come from.
I started renting myself around the same time these issues came up, and I even just asked for like a fly screen door, like just can I please have a fly screen on the front door, And they said no, and I like that would have cost them like thirty dollars. So and they kept bumping the rent up on us. Hence why we now live with the in laws, because every they kept bumping it up and I kept going back saying no, I will accept CPI increase and they match that. But it's just I thought it was unfair.
So how can I put higher rent on them if they're in poor living conditions?
So you just have your head screwed on. I like that. Tell me a bit more. You mentioned that one of the things that was getting in the way of your money goals was your rental property issues. Tell me a bit more about that. When did they start to come to fruition, Like did you purchase Obviously, when you purchase, hopefully you had a good solicitor that took you through like here's the strata, this is what it's going to cost, this is what it means. Here are any potential issues.
But when did it become a massive issue for you? And yeah, tell me a bit more about that, because that's one of the like I don't want to say horror stories, but it's one of the things that if you're purchasing property, you just don't want to run into that issue.
Yeah, and when I did purchase the property with my fiance, I grilled everything, so it's definitely taught me learning curve. But yeah, I recognized it when like I didn't have any communication or any issues for two years, so I
just fought things for good. And then I noticed on one of the inspections at the bathroom looked like there was a bit of mold, and I just emailed and was like, hey, like, can you send me some more photos If that's mold, I would like to get a builder in and get things sorted, like can you arrange an inspection? And a response back it was just oh, you could just tell it was going to go downhill. It was like there's been a leak, our builders onto it. Don't worry about it.
I'm sorry, that's not what I asked.
Yeah. I got the property manager and was like, look like that's great, thank you for being on top of it, but like, I still want to do an inspection. When did the league happen? It was six months ago. They didn't tell me. Yeah, and as soon as that happened, I was like, shit, here we go. So I kept
pushing for an inspection. And it took about a couple of months and I finally got to like go in and have a look, and oh, it was like the most a fighting day because like if I sold the house on the spot that inspect I potentially would have had to drop the pice by like twenty thirty k because of the amount of work that was needed. And it was so defining considering I work so hard, Like at one point I had five jobs, Like there was even points where.
I had two jobs.
Yeah, because I was like, I was so determined to get this house.
No, I love that so much.
Yeah, so I was like, this is so defining.
And to not be told You're like, I'm literally paying you to be in communication with me and you're not. So what happened then? Obviously there was mold and it was identified.
Yeah, there was so many things, Like I knew I purchased a house with an issue in the bedroom and the issue had grown. No one told me the balcony flooded the living room. There's so many issues. So from there, like I tried to build a relationship with the tenants. Once the real estate left. He kept trying to avoid me talking to.
Them, so of course they do I was.
Like, you're kidding. So I gave him my email address and I'm like blind see see me and everything, like, I'm going to try and track things from here. They don't get along with the real estate. They don't report things to the real estate because they had a lot of issues, so things weren't getting reported.
A lack of communication ends up ruining everything.
Yeah, so I was like, just tell me. So I did a whole page of works and I sat down with the property manager and said, look, draw a line in the sand. Whatever's history, I don't care, like it needs to be brought up to a good condition. This is my list of things to do. So many times I followed up for months. For every two weeks I called them, I kept trying to follow through, and I
never got a response. I rocked up there. I've had meetings with the strata manager and she said, yeah, we'll get things sorted.
And they're not doing it. Still.
No. Well, they did go in and fix the bedroom, but they were meant to fix the balcony at the same time. And for a year straight, they kept telling me that it's being fixed. They're like, it's been fixed, it's been fixed. I'm like, showed me the invoice. I want to see the invoice. They never sent me the invoice. I put motions down, I phone called, emailed everything for a year, and then I got I had enough. The
balcony flooded. I put five grand worth of electrical through that property, and all the water I went through my new electrical and I lost it. I was so angry. I called them and I was like, you promised me.
Did they ever have to pay for that? Because to me, that just seems like negligence and that's not your responsibility, and I mean that becomes quite complicated, But what did you do well?
When I called her, she was kind of like gaslighting me a little bit because she said it had been done and like send me the invoice on the phone and it didn't have anything for the balcony. And she's like, oh, call my contractor. I was like, you can call me back in an hour with an answer. Please. If not, I'm going to fair trading.
You're a savage, you're on the job. You can work for me. Like, I don't know what you'll do, and I don't have these issues, but like I just know that I want you on my team. If I've got an issue. I'm calling you, You're going to fix it.
I got to that point because I was so stressed, and I was like, I've given you two years to actually come to the party, and I tried to be nice and support you and like just work together, and you just threw it in my face. So yeah, I started to become a bit savvy.
Yeah. Good, you have to be, especially when they're literally walking all over you. So what happened? I know that they ended up getting the boot.
Yeah, so they called me back and said I was right, and I was.
Like, okay, wow, what a coincidence.
Yeah. I was like, thank you for finally listening. So after that phone call, Yeah, that was a line in the sand for me, I was like I'm done. I went and got a new property manager. But obviously changing the strata is quite hard because you have to go through the right process and get everyone to agree.
With your house. How many different owners are there in your strata?
Thankfully there's only six. I'm not in a massive unit. And it also is you think it's fifty percent of people at the meeting, you need fifty percent of that boat. So everyone at the meeting because half the people didn't show up. They agreed, so thankfully I had a relationship with them, and they also have similar issues that we could move forward to a new strata.
I'm always so confused, like as somebody who has worked my butt off to get into my first property and you'd be the same. It blows my mind that you could organize a strata meeting and then people literally don't turn up. I'm like, this is like a property that you own, this is your wealth, Like why don't you care? Especially because I'm assuming that you well articulated to them why you needed the meeting and shared all the issues, like if they're issues in my house, but they're probably
in yours as well, Like do you want this? Like we're spending money on this and you don't care, Like what in the wealth? Like how?
Yeah, And that's a common thing. And that's my tip. If you're having any issues in astrata, get your ass for the meeting, jump on the strata committee, like don't ignore it.
Yeah one hundred percent. And I feel like saying I'm on the strata committee sounds really complicated, but it's not not. Yeah, it's absolutely not all right, So tell me a bit more. You got somebody new you got all the issues sorted? How much did it cost you?
Thankfully a lot of the issues fell back to strata, So at the moment, I haven't actually had to do that much of money out of my own pocket, but I do have around fifteen K estimated of renovations that I need to do now.
Yeah, And is that off the back of all the damage or is that you adding value to the property?
All the painting in the carpet would be off the back of the damage, but everything else would be us adding value. Yeah.
Okay, so not too bad. And I mean fresh carpets and stuff like that expensive, but it makes the apartment just feel so much more welcoming as well. So I mean there's probably a lot of value in doing that. So now all of that is there, there's fifteen grand worth of things that you probably need to spend on. Is that kind of your big money goal? Is that what you're saving for or where's that going to come from? How's that going to work?
Well, I've already got that money in savings.
Oh look at you go, otto worryve, I've already got it in savings. Okay.
It's just also like if I'm worried because that is a big chunk of my savings. After the house, I'm just like, oh, what are we going to have left?
But it's a bit like that right. Property can feel like an absolute money pit, and it's a massive goal for so many people in our community, and I totally get it. It was a massive goal for me as well. But you really need to weigh up what that could add to your financial burden. Like for us, we're exactly
the same. Like we found out all the plumbing in the back of the house had literally been done DIY, like it all had to be replaced, and because it wasn't identified in the building and pest inspection, like, it wasn't something that I could weigh up like money diarist. When we removed the deck on the back of the house, their idea of plumbing was they had literally hit a hole into a storm water drain. Like I am pretty convinced they just did it with a hammer. They smashed
a hole into the store water drain. It wasn't even cut, it was smashed, and that was how they were dealing with the drainage under the deck.
I see all that at work too with compliance because of town planning. Yeah, and some of the stuff that they do is insane. So the whine when I bought this property, I checked everything.
I was calling counsel, So you did everything and still got stooged.
Oh no, this was my second property. I checked everything. The first property, the rental, I had no idea of stout.
Okay, well, that makes me feel a little bit better that you didn't get absolutely screwed from the start. But it is really stressful, right like, and if you don't know what you're looking for, like you just don't know. And that's why paying the professionals can really help sometimes. Like I remember when we were first purchasing my house, we found this like three bedroom apartment and at the time, our budget only allowed for we thought maybe like a
two bedroom, like I don't know, unit or something. So this three bedroom apartment seemed really lux and I was very excited about it until my solicitor was like, Victoria, have you read the minutes of the strata meetings? And I'm like, no, I didn't even know you could do that.
And all of the cladding on the outside of that property was needing to be replaced because it was a fire hazard and it was going to cost like four hundred grand across all of the people that own the apartments, So in addition to us purchasing, it was very clear that there was probably fifty thousand dollars in addition that we would have needed to tip in at some point
to replace the cladding. And I was like, I didn't even know that was a thing, Like, it's crazy to think that if we hadn't looked, we might have ended up in a situation which would have been financially crippling at the time, like it would have absolutely ruined us. I probably would have had to sell, Like that's not something that I would have had.
And that's a very good point that you bring that up, because now in Sydney, a lot of my friends can only buy sort of apartments because that's in their price range. And if you don't look at the minutes and you don't chat with your solucidar and go into that detail, you could be in a situation like that. Because I have a friend who's currently in that situation. That's a really good point.
And there are probably people listening to this going what are you talking about? But if your apartment building or the apartment building that you're looking at has a strata
or a body corporate. They're going to have meetings and they might have them quarterly or every year, but you will have access to the meeting minutes, so the notes from the meetings to see what they were talking about, and then you can see if there are any issues from that, because if I was in a strata, you know what I'm bringing up in the meeting, the issues I have.
And if you get to a point where you say you've already purchased it and you don't know where to go from there, like fair Trading has been very helpful and they have a lot of information and you can have a chat with them about your issues. So yeah, if you do get to a point where you have purchased in I did lean on Fair Training.
Good because that's what they're there for.
The only thing is but if you put a complaint in. They're there to protect the strata. They're not there to advertise the issues. So it's very hard to determine which strata.
That's so stressful. All right, money dires, let's go to a really quick break on the flip side. I want to ask you a few more questions because you said, no, that was my first property and I was like, excuse me, okay, baller, I want to talk about investments and debt and your best and worst money habits, So guys, don't go anywhere money,
diarist do. We are back and we have been talking about strata, which has been honestly really interesting for me but probably eye opening for a lot of people who probably didn't realize how much control you can still have while being in a strata. You mentioned before nov that was with my first property. The next question I've got is do you have any investments? My friend? How many houses do you have?
So with houses, we just successfully got our second house. Congrats, So I avoided strata at like, I did not go get anything with strata. So yeah, we are in settlement at the moment.
Oh, how exciting. Tell me So this first property, did you buy that on your own?
Yeah? So my first property was on my own. I actually do give credit to my mother because she did help me a lot with that. A lot of people didn't take me seriously twenty two year old like trying to get a house. So I do give her a lot of credit. So she did help with guaranteal as well. And then after a year or two and I had better finances. I refinanced to get her offt alone.
How good is that though, that after two years you got to get rid of her as a guaranteur, Like I feel like so many times when you're speaking about guarantees, you think it's going to be for the life of the loan. But why did it free up? Did you pay off enough or did the property price change? Like did you end up with some more equity?
How I did try and do as much as possible in that first two years towards the principle. I did get a bit of a pay increase as well, and with the second job it helped me with a lot of the bills that I would have originally taken from savings, so I could get a bit of a chunk of savings as well. So all my fine answers were a little bit better than the first assessment of my life with it for the loan, so that helped, and I was able to get them off. And it was also
very low interest rates at the time. I think I refinanced and it was about two percent.
Okay, nice for some that sunheard of in this day and age. Yes, yeah, So tell me a little bit more about that first property. I'm really pervy. How much did it cost? I know you had a guarantee, but like, how much did you have to save? How much did it cost? What was it worth? What's it worth now? Like I need all the juicy dats, like the babe this is anonymous, Like I want to know all the details that would be inappropriate to ask you if we're at dinner together.
No, that's fine. So the first property, the rental, it was four and a half and I had forty five K savings already for the deposit. My parents were guarantel for around about ninety K to help me with that, so I ended up getting the full loan. It's currently been. I had to do a reevaluation for the next property. It's currently sitting at five seventy five or something.
Oh how good is that?
Yeah? So, and I think I've only had it for about six years and it's gone up. So it's not like obviously as much as the house. And it's a little bit different to a unit because it's actually the townhouse. It's like a juplex, so that has affected the value a little bit. But anything up is better than nothing.
I'm sorry, that's a lot up, Like yeah. I always say like in this economy, but literally, in this economy, for it to have gone from four point fifty to five seventy five, like that is very nice because, as you guys know, I run a mortgage broking business, sealer money, and we talk every day with people about buying property, and we really have to dispel this idea that property is going to work the same way that it did
for your parents. So like when my parents had the ability to purchase, it wasn't unheard of to have a property that you purchase and then twenty years later it goes from being worth like fifty grand to like four meal. That's obviously a little bit sensationalized. Like that was quite you know, you would believe it that stuff did happen. It doesn't happen anymore because our economy can't sustain it.
But to see a property go up a couple of hundred grand, yes, please, Like I'm quite happy with that for you.
When I got the reevaluation, I was like, oh my gosh, because I was working off the previous one and that's where I was like, I met a financial loss.
But when I saw your oh my god, yeah exactly, And that's you creating wealth for yourself. Okay, so you did that on your own obviously had your mum. That's really good. But you have a fiance, is that who you've just purchased your second property with. Tell me about this purchase.
This purchase is out of Sydney because obviously the market is bit better. I went looking with him for a couple months at the time, did go looking for a house, came back with a ring, and then three weeks later I went up again and then found the house so very nice. Yes, we purchased together. In regards to the financials that we use for that, obviously my equity or my financials were tied up in an asset compared to my partner who was tied up in cash and savings.
So we had both different financial situations. So when we were going for the loan, it was his money for the deposit and then I did everything else and I had the equity to sort of counteract that.
Yeah, and a good broker would have been able to sit you down and go, well, this is what it's going to look like money direst and here are a few different options, and like talk through that. I think that so many people are like, oh, it's a bit complicated. Maybe we can't buy because we don't have a deposit. It's like we'll actually go and talk to someone about how that might work, because it can be a bit complicated, but a broker can sort it all out. So what did you purchase for?
So we purchased for seven thirty.
K oh, very nice? And what did you purchase for seven thirty? Is it a townhouse? Is it a house? Is it an apartment? I know it's not an apartment because you said no strata.
Yeah, no strata. It's a standalone house. It's probably like three bedroom, two car Okay. It's on a quite generous block as well. Cold sacks, so we.
Happyly the cold a sack?
How beautiful And it's probably like five minutes walk from the beach.
How good is that?
Yeah? But it's a complete Rehno, like it hadn't been touched in thirty years. The tenants that are in there now have been there for that long. So okay, considering nothing's been done to it, I'm like, this is a perfect reno at the same time as we moving right now and it'll be perfectly fine.
And is that the intention? Are you and your partner going to be moving into that property.
We hope too. But first it'll be six months of reno's at the rental property, and then it'll be rennoing that new purchase and then hopefully it'll be moving up there.
Yeah, and so the plan is to is it still leased out for the interim to the same people.
Yeah, thankfully, because we didn't expect to get the house as quick as we did. We thought it would come towards the end of the year. So yeah, we're keeping them on for another six months and then when we're ready to switch to that house, we can do that in March. Yeah.
How good? And have they been good about it? Obviously having lived there for so long, like they probably a bit attached. What did that look like? Yeah?
I remember because I was the first one at the inspection and the lady wouldn't let the real estate in because she was so attached to the property. She didn't know there was an inspection too. I don't think that was communicated to her. And when I had a chat with the real estate I was like, oh, I didn't know if you wanted me to like interrupt or anything, and he was like, no, no, no, it's just they've been here for so long. They're very attached, which is
which is fine. Like their grandkids go through there like that, you can tell they're very attached to the home.
Oh, that's really sad at the same time as like being so sweet that they've looked after it. Like, oh, money diarist, tell me about debt. So obviously you purchased for four fifty. What do your mortgages look like now? And do you have any other debt?
Yeah? So my other debt is a hextet of seven grand, but I estimated that would be gone by next financial year with the salary sacrifice. And then you've got my rental property, which is sitting around three ninety I think it is.
Hey, that's pretty good on a five seventy five property.
Okay, so I'm kind of glad that that's underneath the four hundred number. That was really good to see.
Isn't it crazy that in our heads somehow that makes a lot of sense. We're like, oh, but it's under four hundred grand. It's like, well, where did you get that number from? And you're like, I don't know.
It just feels good, Yeah, it just feels good, like you've dropped down it doesn't feel as big as it would if it's three nine nine, Like.
It just exactly three ninet nine. That's astronomical. Three ninety Oh, that's that's doable. Yeah, And what about the second property, the second.
Property, the I believe the loan would actually be a six ninety because of the deposit we put into it. So the loan isn't as the full price.
Yeah, because your partner had cash, didn't they. Yeah, yeah, okay, so that makes a lot of sense. So it's just hex and property at the moment.
Yes, we did pay off a car loan two, which is great before the house. So we've ticked that one off to already.
And is this partner's first property. Yes, I lokey love that you were the one that got in first. You're like, oh, I look at how much I bring to this relationship.
Yeah. Well, when I first started dating him, because I knew he had that savings there, and I was like, oh, like it was a little bit deflating, to be honest, because I knew mine my savings were wrapped up in an asset.
What do you mean you've got assets that are creating wealth. I want to like go back and shake you and be like, I'm sorry, this dude just has cash, like, h.
Yeah, because it was sometimes where like because you had that financial behind you, especially during COVID, where you had like your job wasn't secure, like sometimes you did have that regret come through. Yeah, so it's hard to like shake that off with the imposter syndrome as well.
Like I genuinely feel like women are the worst at this. They're like, oh, but it's not good enough. What like absolutely not? You were in absolute catch. Obviously you're engaged because you said in your letter in fiance, do you have wedding plans? If so, tell me about the finances, like, how are we funding a wedding in this economy? My friend?
Yeah, well it only happened like potentially a month ago, so oh.
My gosh, did that Actually that's so exciting.
And then we got the house a couple of weeks later.
So show me your ring, show me your ring. This is very important. Oh it's like a gorgeous gold band with an oval. You are living the dream, my friend. Did you have any say in what that was going to look like?
No? I had no idea it was coming. I know, like I told my friends, I wanted an oval, but like, yeah, he did everything. He went out and picked it like I didn't have any So he did very well for himself because he doesn't usually plan a lot of things. So the fact that he planned this and then like the proposal and everything, I'm.
I'm surprised you. How did he propose? We need to know.
Well, we went looking for houses and afterwards, after we finished the whole day of looking at like ten different houses, we went to like a lookout and he asked me at the lookout.
Oh my god, why is that so wholesome? There's something about like simple but well thought through proposal.
Yeah, and we'll think it was like he's like, well, if we're buying something for the rest of our lives, might as well have like a ring. So oh good. I love that.
So have you spoken about weddings.
We've spoken about like a location, but considering the house and the stress, like I didn't realize how insane settlement and stuff were. I haven't really had time to like really pick a date or look at anything.
Ah. That is so fair, especially because you've only engaged for a month, Like you have so much time. Money arsed, What do you think your best money habit is.
I kind of have too, considering I was brought up with only thinking about like needs and wants and being able to split that into two separate categories. I usually only buy things that I need and like maybe like once a season or something like winter or summer, I'll go out and buy things that I want, like with clothing. I don't care about brands and all that sort of stuff. Yeah, I'm pretty good at sticking to what I need and making a list of what I want and then figuring
out which one I'm going to do first. But the main money habit that I have been doing since I was young was my employer splits my pay up for me and it goes into four separate accounts like what saving spending, and a house account. So when I get my pay I only see two hundred and fifty dollars, which is my spending, and in my mind, I'm only getting paid two hundred and fifty dollars, even though in the background the money is going elsewhere already.
So your employee lets you set it up that they pay into like four separate accounts for you.
Yeah, because they have a fancy system, it allows you to do that. But my partner just does the automatic transfers, so you can do that as well with your own bank.
How good, So you don't even see it, and then you've worked out in your like little budget and cash flow system that two hundred and fifty dollars is it a month a week?
Like?
How often is that on week?
And it's just that's the leftover after all my things are dimmed up.
And what do you spend that two fifty on? Is that like your fun money or is that like groceries or what does that look like?
I think that's just a bit more fun money. It's just like if I ever want like a coffee during the week or something like that, or if I go out on the weekend, I use that money and if there's anything left over, I just turned for it to my savings and start from two point fifty again.
So that's yeah, I feel like that's such a It's very similar to my money masterclass, which you've probably seen online, but I talk about that fund being your food, fuel and fun so like anything that you tap your card for, like you know, if you're getting petrol, you're getting a coffee or you know, for me, I used to play netball, so like that amount of money would go into there, and every single Thursday, I would direct debitit to that account,
and then on that same Thursday, before it transferred, I go in and get rid of the excess and be like, okay, cool, starting clean. And I feel like it's such a good budgeting hack because in the back of my head I always knew, all right, Thursday Friday, and I had it on a Thursday because I knew that the weekend was my busiest time. I'm like, all right, so Thursday, I'm
gonna have new cash. Like in my head, I'm like, it's new cash, and so if I wanted to go for brunch, I'd be like, oh, okay, that's probably you know, like fifty dollars or whatever it is. So like in my head, I'm like I can only do that once. And like budgeting with a smaller amount of money, do you feel that it takes the stress off? Because it did for me, Like I feel like I'm less stressed because all the other stuff is automated in the background.
Yeah, it did a little bit. But then when it got to the point where like because I did have a bad relationship once with money, where like I bought a Kentiki trip, and I cried because it was a want and not a need, and it was the biggest payment I've ever done. And I remember I was so young at the time and I was so upset. So at one point it did get to a point where it's like, oh, I don't have any money, and I didn't want to tap into that savings, even though I
knew I had a big chunk of savings. And I think it's because I had it on the house and I was taking it away from that dream and putting it to something else. So at a point it did. It was a little bit negative because I kept being like, I don't have any money, when really I do. But once those bills at the bill's account started telling up, like oh my god, it was so much easier when a bill came in, I can just pay it because I knew that I had at least a year of
bill saved up. So it did take a weight off my shoulders.
I feel like that's where people just assume that you must be really good at money, therefore it doesn't stress you. And that's where we need to do a lot of work around our money mindset and what that money is actually for and if it's for fun, it's for holidays, Like you've got to find a way to enable yourself to spend it. Otherwise we're going to just be stressed about money forever. Have you changed your mindset around that now?
Yeah, So after my little travels, I did sort of get a different attitude where like, experiences and things that I want sometimes are worth it, and that even though it is a want and you don't need it, like, it's fine to spend that money if you're going to be happy. So like, for example, I moved out with my partner after COVID and we started renting, and everyone told me renting is dead money, but we are able to be together every day and that experience.
See, I think it's a lifestyle choice. Rent money is not dead money. At the end of the day, You're going to have to pay in some way, shape or form to put a roof over your head. Like exactly, if you've got the privilege of living a home, fantastic, but like that's not something that everybody has. So whether you're paying cheap rent or expensive rent, that comes down to lifestyle costs and the lifestyle you want to lead. And I think that the idea that rent money is
dead money. It's like, well, actually it's not. And that's actually a pretty entitled thing for people to think, because we all need to put a roof over.
Our head exactly. And the experience of living with my partner when you just were in COVID and I couldn't see him for like six weeks straight, like it was a relief.
Yeah, and it would have been so stressful.
Yeah, I was happy to pay for that like one hundred percent.
All right, tell me, now, what do you think your worst money habit is.
I think I overcomplicate things, Like even my brokers like you have too many bank accounts.
So sit down, I'll do what I want.
Yeah, I think I overcomplicate things. I look at things too much, or I go through the budget too much, and I read you the formula too much, especially when it comes to at the moment I'm trying to conjoin finances with my partner and it because I overthink everything, or I have so many bank accounts, it's actually making it more complicated than it should be. And I think
I'm just going in a downward spiral. So yeah, and now that we've purchased everything with the house, I'm like, I'm going to have to redo this again and that's like I don't want to, but I know I need to.
Yeah, and how do you manage that at the moment? Are you're a spreadsheet early? Are you a back of the envelope girl? Is it all in your brain? Like how are you budgeting?
I have a spreadsheet. I'm a massive spreadsheet pan So at the moment, I haven't got a budget spreadsheet updated, but I have a spreadsheet with every single bill that we've had in the past six weeks. Because our bills came at the same time.
Oh how good? That would be so handy.
Yeah, it was like, when's the billed?
You?
What account are we going to pay from? Because we've got accounts everywhere and we're not joint yet, and who it's to just because all our bills came at the same time as we're paying everything for settlement.
Yeah, and it's so stressful, it's so overwhelming. Hey, all right, well, I'm actually going to give you my money masterclass because in my money masterclass, there is a so there's a singles option, but then there's also a couple's option of how basically my husband and I manage money together, especially if you now have a mortgage and it really turbocharges the use of your offset to make sure that everything goes in and then out, and it will simplify everything
for you so that you can kind of see your partner and then yours and then what is together, and it's all automated. So hopefully with that spreadsheet you've made with all your bills, you can then take all of those numbers, put them into my spreadsheet and then have a really clean outcome. And I think that my favorite part of this is you and I are already on the same page about having that food, fuel, and fun account, so like it's basically going to align to your values
or ready. So I'm excited for you to look at it. Also, if you're a spreadsheet early, you're gonna think it's really esthetic. You're gonna be like, excuse me, what do you mean?
It's all automatic. Like there's even like a debt tracker in there, so you put in your mortgage, you put in their interest rate and then will tell you how long it'll take for you to pay it off, and then you can like play around with, well, what would an additional ten dollars a week look like, and it'll show you how much time it cuts off, which obviously I'm really proud of. I don't know if you can hear it in my voice, but like, I think it's real cool.
Thank you so much, especially the fact that it's set up to be with an offset, because that's what we have too. We have the offset, so it might be like perfect that I start using that and then it rains me in.
So it's obviously going to turbocharge it if you have an offset, but if you don't have an offset, it operates on a cash hub system to make sure that every single dollar that comes in is going to work as hard for you as you do. Free it because I just look at it and go, how many times do we just like lose money along the way, like small amounts that just all away. So it really simplifies it to make sure that you're capturing as much as possible.
And instead of budgeting and I mean, I'm obviously a fan of this, but I think you'll like it, but instead of budgeting in terms of restricting yourself, it just shows you, hey, money, diarist, this is what you're spending. Are you okay with it? And you're going to go oh yeah, or oh, I actually want it to go somewhere else, Like it's not really about crucifying yourself, which I feel like in your money story you probably fall into doing really easily, which we don't want to do.
We want to have a positive money mindset.
Thank you so much for that, and also might keep me in line and don't overcomplicate things like.
Oh, I'm excited, and I mean you deserve it. You shared your whole money story with our community. That's the least I can do, money diarist before we go, you have just told me so much about your journey, Like
you are so cool. You're not even thirty yet. You work in local council, you're doing town planning, You're earning twenty three grand a year in rental income that you set up when you're basically still a child for real, Like you negotiated and I mean you did say you had your mum's help, but like girl power, like she made sure that you're in the right position. You got this investment property, it was what four point fifty and
now it's five seventy five? Are you joking? Like you are creating wealth for yourself, but at the start you're like, oh, I don't know, maybe I'm a Bee. And then you go on to say, I've just you know, bought my first house with my partner. I also have an investment property. That's what I brought to the relationship. Also, when I was talking to you about money goals and you were like, oh, yeah, I really want to like fix the house, and I'm like, oh, how much do you have to save? You're like, oh,
I actually already have that in savings. I was like, what, Like, you already have that cash sitting to the side, and you're so clear about like other debts. You're like, oh, I've got the mortgages, but also the only other debt I've got its hex. Yeah, there's only seven grand, and I already know in my head that that seven grand next financial year is going to go what like B for real money, direst Do you actually think you're a bee?
Because I think there are going to be a lot of people listening going is a bit du lulu.
Yeah, Like I did think about maybe like a B plus because I know that having two homes before thirty in this climate is insane.
It's really cool.
Yeah, Like you probably won't hear that from a lot of people, So I definitely know, like that's insane, but I always think like there's more to learn, there's more to improve on. So that's where that A would be. Like, there's so many things I can do, like between like learning stocks or getting to a position where I can put extra payments into my super or my homelan, like, those things are things that I feel like would get me to an A.
But they're all completely doable, which is kind of cool. So that I feel like there's a lot more about money mindset than you going oh, I have a lot of work to do. It's more around going oh, I actually need to sit down with a spreadsheet and work out what additional mortgage payments I could have or what amount of money I have for investment if that's in line with my goals and value. So like that's so doable.
The next time I talk to you, you're gonna be like the I'm basically an A, and I'll be like I know I already.
Hopefully by the next time I talk to you, my houseland's a bit lower, and then I'll definitely be like an APAs.
Yeah, one hundred percent, all right, money dove, Sadly, that is all we have time for today. It has been a pleasure. I have loved talking to you. My favorite thing ever is just talking to people about their journeys and going, how on earth have you done that? Like at the end of the day, like ninety five grand really great salary. But also i'd say, in our community a relatively common one, so lots of people are going to be like, hold up, how did she do this?
And it's actually just hard work. Like at the end of the day, it's no magic. It's no like, oh I got given you know, a big deposit or a big inheritance, Like no, you actually just had to work really hard, and now it's paying off because it's been what six years, and now it's paying for itself. How good?
I know. It's just bigger and better from here.
I love it. Well, Thank you so much. I've adored learning more about you, and I just know that the community has to so it has been a pleasure, and I hope that we get to cross paths in person at some point.
Thank you so much, and thank you for having me on.
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