START HERE! HELP! I am 38 and don't know what to do! How can I catch up?

new series. Start here. This is where I will be answering your questions when it comes to what you should be thinking about, learning about, and quite possibly doing to get your finances moving in the right direction where you can potentially make up for lost time and stay ahead of the So let us begin now. Before we begin today's episode, I must do my upfront compliance duties, and that is to remind everyone that this episode, as with all of my episodes, are general advice only. Nothing is

personal advice, product advice, strategic advice, or investment advice. And that is simply because I do not know anything about your goals, your dreams, your situation, your liabilities, your deadlines, or your risk profile may be and the finer details. All of my advice is educationally based only. Not at any stage is this personal advice, investment advice, product advice, or even strategic advice. It is simply to help educate you offer as a guide for your further research, analysis,

and investigation. Please always refer to my financial planning and general advice warning in the podcast notes. All right, with that done, let us begin. So the other day I received a DM on Instagram and it said, Hi, Canna, I'm absolutely loving your work. I'm sure you get dms, but I was wondering if you had an episode or could create one about people in a similar situation to me. I'm thirty five, don't own my own home, and I haven't been great with money. I earn eighty thousand dollars

a year. I have sixty thousand dollars in savings and two thousand dollars in my emergency fund. My expenses are low as I live at home, but continue beating myself up as I should be in a better position financially. I'd love to start investing for my future security, but I feel it is too late at my age. So this is the birth of the new series. As I said, start here. This is where I'm going to open up the forum for you to be able to reach out directly to me on Instagram and ask me what I think.

What I suggest you start learning about, investigating, understanding, and potentially applying in your life after getting personal advice from a financial plan. These episodes start here to help get the wheels in motion again, help you find your faith and calmvidence in yourself and create that direction, that purpose, that clarity, so you can go from strength to strength and quite possibly help you make up for lost time where you can potentially end up being ahead of the game.

So once you've listened to this episode, don't be afraid to send me a DM asking me where should I start? All right, so the first thing I think about when I read this DM is that it is never too late. When you put the right sensible, wise intelligent strategies in place, you can make up for lost time. And in fact, sometimes if you are really persistent and determined, you can actually get ahead of the game. You see, I don't really believe in any mistakes. And it's that old Buddhist saying,

when the student is ready, the teacher appears. So what my advice to you to start is to actually behind yourself, be compassionate, beating yourself up that you've been bad with money, wasted time. Wasted money serves no one, especially you. So it is time now to draw a line in the sand and say to yourself, I'm now going to do things differently. I'm going to do things better, and I'm going to honor my future financial wellbeing as well as

my mental and emotional financial wellbeing. And for the record, no one is dumb or bad with money. You get started as soon as you possibly can. The second thing that stands out to me is the importance and I think need right now for some simple kindness and compassion towards yourself. We are all doing the best we can

do with the resources we've got. And to me, I may be making a bit of an assumption here, but I have a feeling that no one has actually ever sat down and given you any form of financial education whatsoever. I would put money on it, and I'm not a gambling person, so this says a lot. But I would pretty much suspect that no one's talked to you about money.

No one's talked to you about how to do a budget, or how to use a credit card wisely, or how to start investing, or why your superannuation is so important. And then I would also suspect that no one's ever taught you how to set some simple financial goals for yourself. So what I would love for you to do right now is to draw a line in the sand and know that it is great that you're aware of this now, because you're now going to do something about it directly.

You're going to step up. You're going to take this problem with two hands by the horns and put some smart, intelligent, wise actions in place as quickly as you possibly can. Now, where do I think you should start? Again to remind you that this is general advice, because to this person who sent me this DM, I actually, other than the fragmented information you've provided me right here, I don't know much about you. I don't know the details of your goals.

I don't know what the time frame is for these goals. I have no idea what your risk profile is. I have no idea what debts you may have, maybe credit cards or car loans, or personal loans or maybe investment loans. And I also don't know about what you value, what's really important to you. So again, for all the listeners, and particularly for this person who sent me this DM, please take this as general advice only and as a guide to get you moving. But this is where I

recommend you start. Start here. So here are some assumptions I'm going to be making in this particular episode for you, the writer of this DM, and also for the listeners. So Number one is I'm going to assume, for simplicity here and educational purposes, that there is no toxic debt right now, so there's no credit card car loans or

personal loans. I'm also going to make the assumption here that there is no desire to buy a home, and that this particular person values financial freedom first before buying a property, and that they are a long term investor. They understand that it takes time to make money, and they're certainly not looking for any get rich quick schemes because that's not my jam. So this is where I recommend you start. Number one, invest some time writing down

some goals. Financial goals. Goals that excites you, goals that make you feel empowered, Goals that even maybe scare you a little. And if you don't know where to start, can I recommend having a goal that is based around what I call a mindful money number goal, a passive income goal. So you would set a goal for yourself to build a passive income for example of twenty thousand dollars a year or fifty thousand dollars a year, or eighty thousand dollars a year or one hundred and twenty

thousand dollars a year. A mindful money number goal is the amount of passive income that you would like to build over time for yourself to give for yourself that sense of financial freedom and for this person security. And you may want to keep this number low initially as you find your feet and build your faith and confidence within yourself, but having a goal to build up a passive income is definitely a goal that you're never going

to regret setting for yourself. Trust me on that, I'm a financial planner and I've always been working on my financial goals. Not only does this excite me and motivate me and make me accountable with my money, it also acts as a beacon of light for those times where I'm frustrated, annoyed, or just having a crap day. So invest time setting goals for yourself, but most importantly, having a mindful money number that is a passive income goal.

Number two emergency money. You mentioned in your DM that there is only two thousand dollars in emergency money. That is simply not enough. You really need to sit down and look at your individual situation and what your life, your responsibilities look like, and what the cost of things going wrong would be. Then look at three of those expenses happening all at the same time. That will start to give you a much clearer idea as to how

much emergency money you need. Now. I actually have an episode purely based on working out how much emergency money you need on both Sugar Mummers fireplay and on how do you afford that? Or how do they afford that? I should say, so make sure you have enough. But I can tell you for the record, two thousand dollars is not enough. I don't care how much annually you've got, how much sickly you've got, the fact that you live at home. You need to be real about what your

situation looks like and what could possibly go wrong. It's about being real, responsible and honest with yourself. Now, once you've worked out how much emergency money you need, you need to make sure that it is kept in a separate savings account away from your everyday spending account, and you nickname it my emergency money, and if possible, put the amount of emergency money in the title to remind you as to how much you must always maintain in

emergency money. This is a non negotiable and just so you know, I've never had someone regret having emergency money. In fact, the only other thing I ever hear is I wish I'd had a bit more in emergency money. Step number three is to do a budget, sit down and look at your living expenses, look at what has

to stay and what could possibly go. Now you're in a very fortunate position to be able to be living at home with low living expenses, so use this to your financial advantage to help maximize how much money you can save, or even better, how much money you can start investing. Now, I'm not sure what that sixty thousand dollars is earmarked for, and I'm not going about to go and provide advice for it, but it is very important that you understand the difference between money for short

term expenses and money for the long term. So money for short term expenses is money that should always be maintained in assets such as cash, fixed interest or term deposits. The reason why is you don't have the benefit of time to see your money bounce around like a go yo with high levels of volatility that often come with

high growth assets. It's a risk versus return balance. So please always keep in mind any money that you think you're going to need within the next one to five years should always be maintained in a safe, conservative environment. Do not gamble with this money. Yes, you may manage to get lucky and double your money or make an extra ten to fifteen percent over that time, but what if that money drops in value last minute with market

volatility and pullbacks and corrections. You never want to be in a position where you have to crystallize a loss. When you do a budget, it really makes you aware of where your money goes, and you can quickly and easily identify any financial waste stage or things that actually you don't vowvalue or value as much anymore, so then you can look at cutting them down or cutting them out completely. Now, to avoid that lifestyle creep, it is

really important that you immediately proactively replace those newfound savings. So, for example, if you realize that you're paying for a subscription service that's costing thirty dollars per month and you realize you don't use it anymore, you don't actually value it anymore and you cancel it, make sure you replace that with a regular savings plan, or a regular investment plan, or a regular debt reduction plan by that thirty dollars, Because if you don't do this, that thirty dollars very

quickly will be end up being spent somewhere else, and you'll be scratching your head, going where did all these newfound savings actually go? You want to proactively take control and redirect them towards your financial goals, whichever they may be. But in this case, let's assume it's a passive income goal, that mindful money number goal. So as you do your budget, go as far back as you can look at the cold heart reality of your bank transactions so you can

see what things actually cost. This will also allow you to see what change in expenses you've experienced without realizing. So a gym membership may have actually gone up without your realization, or you may actually be spending more money on say clothes or restaurants or takeaways than you like to actually think you do. So go through those transactions and go back as far as you possibly can. Now for anyone who's listening, goes, actually, I really need help

with my budget. Please head to my link in the podcast notes because I can share with you the Sugar Mamma Budget and cash Flow Academy, where I teach everyone how to do a budget and build a cash flow system for their individual needs. And this is a brilliant program where you learn how to do a budget the right way the first time, and you just get on and deal with it and don't only have to think about too much going forward because it starts working for

you quickly and easily. So step number three to reiterate is you've got to do a budget and from that you've got to work out where your savings or even better investment plan can begin. So, as I said, look at all those things you've been able to cut out and cut down, add them up, and then set up a regular investment plan, ideally where that newfound savings accumulated

go into a separate savings account. And to make it actually happen and not create another task on your list of things to do, set up a regular savings plan so that the moment you get paid that thirty dollars per month or three hundred dollars per month or what are the total amount of things you've been able to

cut out of your budget to free up. Money comes out of your account as a priority a couple of days after being paid and into a separate savings account where it can sit there safely, away from temptation, and accumulate and be used when you're ready to start investing or working on that particular financial goal. Step number four is to do some work on your mindset. Clearly, in reading this DM, I can see that this person is really feeling very insecure, lacking a lot of faith and

self confidence within yourself. This doesn't serve you. You need to realize you're actually doing a great job. The fact that you're listening to these episodes around investing and financial freedom and independence is brilliant. That to me shows you're very motivated, You've got direction, and you clearly understand the importance of all these things because you've made these decisions and you've reached out directly to me. As I said,

you have sixty thousand dollars in savings. That is evidence you're actually smart with money and you actually know to have emergency money, even though it may not necessarily be the right amount. Can you please take a moment to give yourself a pat on the back, and can you also get excited about these new goals about what your

future is now going to look like. And you now know that it is never too late, and you've got plenty of time and options and opportunities around you to make up for lost time and to get back on track, and even better, to get ahead of the game, and

even better, stay ahead of the game. So write down things that you are grateful for, write down things that you are excited about in embracing this journey, and really look at the things that exist within you that you can turn the volume up and actually become better with what you are doing already. So clearly you're good at savings. So now we need to turn the volume on that skill set that you already have within you and shift it and allow it to evolve and grow into becoming

a great investor. Your greater savings. You're now going to become a great at investing. So work on this and always be aware of your mindset. We all have these little like negative self tught conversations that creep into our minds. We just need to create the awareness so that if we hear them, we shut them down quickly. And laugh them off and then go and replace them with empowering affirmations and positive self talk. Number five is to educate

yourself now. Of course it goes without saying. If this part is overwhelming you don't want to do it, and you know that you're going to procrastinate, go and see a financial planner. This is what they do for a living. They can give you personal advice. They can go into the finer details that's really needed right now and look at the goals, help you even come up with some goals and more details for those goals and actually get

them in place. I think one of the most underested things about a financial planner is they stop the thinking and the talking, but make things actually happen because they

go and do it for you. And before you know it, you've got a share portfolio, and before you know it, you've got a savings plan for an investment property, or before you know you've got a debt recycling strategy in place, or before you know it, your superannuation has now been fixed and corrected and is invested correctly with the right contribution. Advice around how to make sure you've have enough money in retirement. This is the value of financial planner it

is they get things done. And if your time poor find is overwhelming and want to spend your weekends with your family and friends doing fun things good, go see a financial planner and get them to do it. Delegate. We delegate things like our dry cleaning and our ironing, and some of us are gardening and just the maintenance of our homes and cleaning of our homes. Delegate to

a financial planner. It makes sense. But if you want to go down this path where it's all about self education and doing this for yourself, and you feel a little bit intimidated seeing a financial planner for the short term, which I can kind of understand, make sure you use this time to educate yourself so that when you do see a financial planner, you turn up going, Hi, this is who I am, this is what I've done so far, because I did this, this and this and why, and

this is now what I need from you, And these are the goals I want to achieve, and this is where I want to learn more of and this is what I'd like you to help me to do. That is going to make your relationship with your financial planner so much better. And the financial planner is going to take you really seriously because you know what you want and you are determined to make sure it happens. So we'll make the financial planner's job a lot easier as well.

But as I said, if you're going down the self education path, you've got to pick up some books and start reading them. My book Mindful Money is pretty much a roadmap from start to finish as to what to do. I really focus on how to start investing, how to build up that passive income. I mean the book's called Mindful Money, so it's literally how to build that mindful money number goal. And I talk about, as I said,

debt recycling. I talk about your superannuation, how to invest it correctly, what to look for, how to understand market pullbacks and corrections, the importance of long term investing, being patient, your emotions, your mindset. I do everything in that book. It's a great place to start. The other book that I highly recommend everyone reads, and you would have listened to my episodes with Peter Thornhill, and that's Motivated Money,

particularly if you want to start investing in shares. And then of course you need to educate yourself around superannuation. Why it is so important. Superannuation is most likely going to be the biggest financial asset that we will ever own in our lives. And if you look at how much money our employers are putting in every single year, that percentage is only increasing, so we're putting more and

money in there. Our superinnuation is simply an investment portfolio is just locked away from temptation because the government knows we'll go and spend it, because that's what we tend to do. You should also start educating yourself around the power of gearing. No, that is not advice to start

borrowing money to invest, far from it. It is to understand what gearing is, the risks involve, the costs involved, and when is possibly the right time to consider using something like this, and how to do it in a sensible, wise conservative way that actually adds value to your financial situation in helping you achieve your goals more efficiently and effectively. It's also important that you understand the different types of investments.

I have a huge passion around shares, in particular industrial shares. No, I'm not recommending that, but it's important that you understand there are plenty of others. Some people will be better off looking at bonds, corporate bonds, government bonds. Some people will be better looking at residential investment properties because that's what suits them and their needs. Some people will be better of having a great mix of all of them.

So it's important that you understand what the different asset class is out there and what is the right blend for you. And that is when something like a risk profile comes in. And when you've done a risk profile, you can then use that as a guide to help build up your investment portfolio and let you know where and how you should start investing. Now, I will say this when people ask me where should I start investing.

Obviously I don't tell them more to invest because that could be deemed as advice, and that's responsible and I

don't think about them. But if you are looking at investing and you want a diversified investment portfolio, and you do not want the stress and pressure of working out which investments to invest in, how, when and why and in what amounts and with what market movements and currencies and so forth, this is why we have wonderful products out there like ETFs, diversified ETFs, like high growth ETFs, balanced ETFs ETFs that specialize in certain industries such as

Australian shares, Australian high yield shares, bonds, ethical investments, international investments, a Japan fund, a US fund, a European fund, an Asian fund. They're all immediately diversified. Don't need to worry about those heavy, overwhelming, complicated, very lengthy research processes. Use

those as a guide, educate yourself around them. And of course, you know, if you're interested in industrial shares and the sand share market, a listed investment company is another great vehicle to do research on, So understand that and do that risk profile. Vanguard has one of the best risk profile questionnaires, and it's free. It's there for you, and there's so much available information online for free as well. So once you've educated yourself, it doesn't really actually stop that.

You need to continue on doing this. But the next step is is the moment you are ready, you feel educated, informed, you need to start investing. Get that ball rolling. Waste no time at all, and when you'll know when you're ready, because you'll understand the costs, you'll understand the risks, you'll understand the fees, you'll understand about how to do this

in a smart, intelligent, wise way. And what I recommend you do the moment you have made your first investment, for example, you've decided you want to invest in shares, Australian shares for example, you make that investment and you continue on with that journey. As I said, this is not a magical formula. This is that's going to fix your finances overnight. This is a long term journey. It's about yes, using dedication and commitment to make up for lost time and even better, as I said, to get

ahead of the game. So focus on your passive income. When it comes to investing. Turn down the noise of the market, what's going on, what stocks and bonds people recommend you should buy and sell, because that's going to confuse and overwhelm you. At the end of the day, you want your money working for you. So yes, you can't bury your head in the sand when it comes to looking at all your portfolio is worth. But what your focus should be predominantly is on your passive income.

How much money is your portfolio making for you and is it growing in the right direction. Because I set the more passive income you have in your life, the more financial freedom and independence you will have. And the objective is, and this is where you should be focusing all of your energy and your resources is building that number up, growing that number from fifteen thousand dollars a year to sixteen thousand dollars a year, seventeen thousand dollars

a year, eighteen thousand dollars a year. And if you are using smart, intelligent two dimensional investment assets such as shares and property that have a capital growth element as well as a passive income element, where the most important the passive income can grow with the capital growth. This growth will also happen organically for you as you commit to a regular investment plan. So when you are ready, start, don't deally daddle and daydream, get moving. And it's funny.

A girlfriend came over to my house the other day and said, can you just help me buy some shares? I've never done it before. I was like, of course, you know, bring your laptop, like, I'll sit and watch you do it. And she did it. And she's sitting there and we did it and she's like now what. I'm like, You've just done it. You've just bought your first pass loop shares. She's like, you're kidding that was it.

I was like, yes, that's it. I'm like, you're going to get some paperwork in the mail in the next couple of weeks. But she's like, am I a shareholder? I'm like, welcome to the club. It is so easy. As I say to people, if you can buy a pair of shoes online, you can buy shares online. So once you've done that, focus on the passive income. And what I recommend is explain in my full money is

take that passive income number and ear market against the goals. So, for example, say your passive income goals to build a passive income of forty thousand dollars a year, and you now know from investing that you've started, say for Simpler City, you've now got a passive income of four thousand dollars a year. You now know you are ten percent of

the way. So next time you go and buy, for example, another paslip shares or ETFs or listened to mess and Companies or whatever it may be, go and look at what the estimated passive income is for that investment and

add it to what you've built so far. So you'll go say from you know, ten percent to twelve percent to fifteen percent to eighteen percent to twenty two percent to twenty seven percent is a slow and steady progressive growth, but in the right direction where you get to that point where you are at one hundred percent capacity, that is, you're making that forty thousand dollars a year in passive income.

So don't worry too much about what the market is because the share market doesn't actually reflect the true value. What do you want to do is see where your businesses are making money and putting money in your pocket. And of course, if and when you can to help with that organic growth, try and enroll in a dividend reinvestment plan if you can afford to. Assuming that this person, as I said, they live at home, their living expenses

are low, they've got a great salary. I'm assuming that this person doesn't need this money and it's for their long term financial security, so reinvesting it is a brilliant idea. However, reinvestment must be done with caution because if you have a reinvestment plan, depending on what your underlying investments are, you want to make sure that your portfolio is diversified. That is, you haven't put all of your eggs in

one basket. You have covered all the necessary asset classes that your risk profile suggests as a guide, and you do need to check your risk profile on a regular basis every I would probably suggest maybe every six months or every year, because the more experience would become, the more comfortable we are with taking educated risk, and of course that is just natural evolution. So it is worth just checking in on your risk profile every year and

to see if it's changed and adjusted. And of course that doesn't mean you have to sell your entire investment portfolio. You may be able to just with new money coming in start investing in those more high growth assets to help make sure that your portfolio is growing. But you're not crystallizing capital gains tax along the way. But make

sure if you can, you are reinvesting. You're not spending that money that you're actually putting that income that you've made, that passive income back into your portfolio for future compounding

growth opportunities. And as you go along the way, make sure you're taking note, even like through a journal, as to how much passive income you have built so far and the date, because I cannot tell you how incredibly inspiring it is to look back and see how far you've come in such a short period of time, and this will give you the motivation to stay true, to stay committed and dedicated to the journey in growing your

passive income and actually creating that true, authentic, sustainable financial security in your life. Step number seven is to protect your wealth. I touched on very briefly about emergency money, and of course emergency money does offer a form of wealth protection for you, but it does actually go far

beyond that. Policies like income protection policy, where if you cannot work due to a medical reason, an insurance company will pay up to seventy five percent of your income until you can return back to work or until a certain age ideally around the age of sixty five, because you can then access potentially your superannuation money. So it's really important that you have protection policies in place. Another one that's important to know about and understand is trauma cover.

This pays a lump sum tax free to you in the event if you suffering a major medical trauma such as a cancer, heart attack, stroke, And it is really important that you take these types of policies out sooner rather than later, because further down the track we tend to have more health conditions. We're aware of maybe hereditary issues, you know, we've maybe been in an accident or broken a few bones, and we now have loadings and exclusions,

which also makes it a lot more expensive. So I've shared with this in other episodes on Sugar Mum's Fireplay. But I took out my personal insurance policy in my early twenties, and I'm so glad I did because if I was to go and reapply for new insurances today, I would not get it. I have the exact same policies in place and they are non negotiables. And my partner Tom is also properly insured. And there's income protection,

trauma cover, life andtputy and life cover. So protect your wealth, be smart, intelligent, and understand things can happen in the blink of an eye. So there are the seven steps to help you start start here. By starting here, you'll be well and truly on the right path again. But the thing is you need to keep going to do this. Listener, you're obviously in a very fortunate position, so you can use this to your financial advantage, and that is to

start building passive income in your life. Whatever amount of passive income you would like. It doesn't matter, just start building it and remember that passive income maybe the pass of income that allows you to switch to part time work. That passive income may eventually help pay your rent, or even better, help pay your mortgage and eventually pay your mortgage off. It also may be the passive income that helps pay for maybe further educational costs for yourself, or

if you have children, for your children's educational costs. That passive income may pay for a holiday every single year, to the destination of your dreams. That passive income may allow you to take sabbaticals regular sabbaticals, And that passive income may actually allow you to have an earlier or even more luxurious retirement. This is the power of passive income.

It gives you not only financial security, which is what this person put in their DM to me, It gives them choice, flexibility, time, and a wonderful sense of financial peace and independence. So, for this listener, and for anyone else that's in a similar situation, has similar questions and queries, draw a line in the sand, step up to the plate, because something deep within you knows that you are actually ready right now. You do not need to waste precious

time and energy beating yourself up anymore. As one of my favorite quotes goes, work hard in silence, let's success make the noise. You now know where to start, so get started today. So to this listener right now, you

now know exactly where to start. You know exactly what you need to do today, and if you're really honest with yourself, you know how exciting it is to be able to know that you are going to be watching your future, your financial future, flourish well into the future, and you'll be so glad that you got started today. So thank you everyone for listening to Sugar Mama's fireplate

for our very first start. Here. To anyone else that would like to send me a d M on Instagram asking them for some advice as to where to get started, please don't be shy, remember, of course, that this is general advice only and for educational purposes. And when in doubt, please please please always go and see a financial planner because they can give you not a general advice, but personal investment strategic product advice. Thank you everyone for listening.

Please feel free to leave me a rating and review. I would greatly appreciate it. Until next time. Stay motivated, empowered, and never stop seeking new ways to achieve your financial goals and dreams. This is sugar warmers. Fie