Her Discussions by Dr Faye - How To Become Financially Stable In Your 20s | Mini Episode

Episode Date: April 23, 2026

Your latest mini episode is here!Every Thursday, we’ll be sharing the Buy or Bye-Bye segment from one of your favourite Her Discussions episodes.This week, we're revisiting our episode with Ola, a leading voice in financial health, featured in BBC News, The Financial Times, and Elle. She’s the perfect guest to answer all your questions about this topic, helping you stop stressing and start building a stronger financial future.In the full episode, we discuss:💰 How to get 10% more from your savings✨ A ChatGPT prompt to help you track your money🛍️ The golden 30-day basket rule (for your next ASOS order)🎄 How to spend £15 vs £50 on Christmas dinners this year👜 1 thing to leave in your purse to save more money🍿 Why cancelling Netflix won’t help you buy a houseListen to the full podcast here:Spotify: ⁠https://open.spotify.com/episode/2eg7f7XyzzMhT8m8ResAxB?si=mpC9WDHFR4KiFBze4gtvwQYouTube: ⁠https://youtu.be/PwE-aTJf9F4Please don’t forget to subscribe - it really helps us grow the podcast.Resources & links mentioned:AllThingsMoney: @allthingsmoney⁠https://allthingsmoney.com/Can I ask you a BIG favour? 💙Please leave a review or rating. It helps us grow the podcast and bring you more amazing guests.Share this with someone who wants to protect their brain, boost focus, or live smarter, it might help them feel more energized and confident.Follow us on social media or join the broadcast channel to send us your questions for our guests:Podcast Instagram: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/herdiscussionspod/⁠Broadcast channel: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/channel/AbY4liwxlLnewx4H/⁠ 🛑 Disclaimers & legal:This podcast is for educational / informational purposes only and does not constitute medical, legal, or financial advice. All opinions are those of the speaker(s).

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Call 16-531-2600 or visitconX Ontario.ca. Next we are going to come on to our buy and bye bye by section. So I'm going to show you a piece of paper and you're going to tell me whether you would buy or like you think it's good basically or say bye bye. Okay. We're going to go first. Isis. Bye. Bye.

Yes. Why do you like an Issa? So an ISO if you are listening, you don't know what it is. An ISO is a tax free account, whether that is a savings account, investment account. And it just allows you to pay less tax to their tax spends. So I'm sure everyone listening would be like yes to the ICER. Yeah. And savings accounts.

Buy as well. Just because obviously with your ICS, you only get a tax-free limit of up to £20,000. So I do recommend opening up a savings account as well. Even if you don't want an ISO, then you've still got your savings account. And yeah, I always recommend everyone start saving. Yeah.

Next we have stocks shares. buy, but I'm hesitant to say bye, only because, like I said, I'm a huge advocate of investing, but when it comes to investing in individual shares, I'm a bit skeptical because I feel like a lot of people try to be really tactical when it comes to investing, and investing really is for the long term. So I personally don't invest in shares, but I do invest in a different type of investment, which I'm sure we'll talk about later on in the podcast. For anyone listening, do you want to, who isn't familiar with, like, stocks and shares, do you want to explain, like, briefly what like stocks and shares just are. Yes. So stock shares the term can be used interchangeably,

but essentially when you're buying a share, you are buying a percentage of a company. So for example, this top of when is from ASOS. So if I want to do invest in ASOS, I would buy a share of ASOS. And that would make me a shareholder. And typically if you are investing in a company, you might get dividends. So if ASOS had a great financial year, they might pay me as a shareholder dividends. So you can also get not only capital gain if the share price appreciated, but you'd also get dividends as well. I hope that we do come on to other options later on, but you made a really good point about investing in individual like stocks and shares. There's obviously people who dedicate their entire lives to picking stocks and picking shares specifically. And most of them never beat

the market. You know, it's a little bit like gambling for finance bros. You know? Like it's gambling for the middle class. Yeah, yeah. So I, yeah, that's. And yeah, they can be good, good option. Like, there's nuance. Yes, yes.

Loans. Oh. These are very broad. Yeah, they are. So, for them we're going to school today, which I love. So I would say, bye, bye, if we're taking loans in its like, in the sense that it is written on this. piece of paper, only because I feel like the lack of financial literacy in the UK doesn't teach us really to manage loans or debt properly. And so I guess loans on this sense that I'm

seeing as is money from either the bank that you want to just use just to buy a car or, and that's not car finance, that's actually just taking 10 grand from the bank because they can give you 10 grand. Or maybe buy now, pay later. I personally am not a user of buy now pay later. So, yeah, I would say bye-bye, but again, a mortgage is a loan. And so you do have great positive loans that you can use to advance in your lives and your careers. But I guess looking at it, face value, I would say bye-bye. Yeah, it's a nuanced, like it's a nuanced topic. Bitcoin.

I'm a buy. Interesting. Okay, go on, tell me, tell me why. So I deliver a lot of financial education workshops. And people love to ask me my thoughts on Bitcoin or just, cryptocurrency in general, and I invest in Bitcoin. But I am a long-time investor. I am a buy and hold. I'm not a trader. So, yeah, I have Bitcoin as part of my portfolio alongside other investments. Yes, Bitcoin is risky, but if you do your due diligence, if you do your research, I'm not

anti it, but I wouldn't recommend putting all your life savings into Bitcoin. Some say the bubbles in an arrow truffle piece can take 34 seconds to melt in your mouth. Sometimes the very amount you're stuck at the same red light. Rich, creamy, chocolatey arrow truffle. Feel the arrow bubbles melt. It's mind bubbling. You use two terms that I'd love you to explain for any listeners who are not clued up in like finances. So you said like a buy and hold person versus like a trader.

Yes. So what are the differences between those two like patterns and what are the pros and cons between between be it both? So like we mentioned, I think a lot of people see investing as gambling. And I would only say gambling is true if you're looking to pick stocks and I guess just day trade. Anyone that can do that well, well done. I've yet to meet someone that has successfully day traded unless you're someone in the London Stock Exchange, for example. But a buy and hold mentality, which is what I do, which what I teach is that when it comes to investing, I recommend investing for at least five. to 10 years because we know the stock market goes up and down. So I always recommend if I'm

teaching someone or I'm coaching someone that investing should be seen as a long-term game. So I think I first invested in Bitcoin in 2020. So I've just held it and we're up quite a bit to be fair, but I just leave it just because I don't need that cash right now. So yeah, I feel like, again, because there are dips, I always try and get people to avoid selling when there's a dip because hopefully you'd like to think over the next couple of years it will always recover. And you only have to look at a stock market graph from like 1990, for example, to see that the trend has always been up. But day to day can often fluctuate.

And I think it's really important for people to remember when it comes to Bitcoin, when it comes to stocks and shares, is that is not the actual money that company is making or that's not real money. The value of stocks and shares, the value of Bitcoin is derived from human psychology. And like humans are notoriously emotional, you know. Humans, like humans are notoriously emotional the way that one minute Bitcoin will be worth a ridiculous amount of money. And then the next it will be, it will completely drop.

That's not because one day the stock of Tesla might be really high and then Elon Musk will say something silly and Tesla will plummet. That doesn't mean that Tesla as a company is making less money. It means that people are valuing a Tesla. stock less and that is based on the human brain that's not based on the business. Supply and demand isn't it? Exactly. So like actually if you just you know you just hold on you weather the storm of human emotion. Yes. And it's almost like weathering your own human emotion because when people panic they buy you know. Yes. When you just sit with that and you go I'm going to stick this out.

I'm going to try and not get get just get rid of the noise. I think that's what is important and that's why I don't invest in individual shares because there's such a high risk of volatility compared to ETFs, index funds, things like that. So, yeah, I think buy and hold if you can. And yeah, I think it's just all about having a diversified portfolio, which means just having as many types of investments as you can in one package.

Or, yeah, just across multiple different industries. So you are well diversified. Nice. Next, we have index phones. Index phones. Bye. Bye. Nice.

Do you want to stop like to say, what are index funds and why is this a big buy from you? Yes. So index funds are essentially a collection of companies held into one package. So like we mentioned earlier with shares, I could have, let's say, a clothing index fund. And that might, rather than me invest in ASOS, I could invest in a clothing index fund,

which might have ASOS, new look, Adidas, Nike, all in that one package. And then my money is diversified across all of those different companies, rather than risking or hedging all my bets into ASOS, they might do really badly. But as an alternative, I can actually invest in that index fund. And let's say if ASOS went bust in that portfolio, hopefully doesn't club by my close from ASOS.

At least I'm diversified across, you know, Nike in Adidas and things like that as well. So it won't have as big as impact compared to if I just invested in individual shares. And if someone was looking to invest in an index fund, what is their first step that, or what is the step-by-step process that's, someone takes to invest in an index fund. Yes. So you've got index funds. You've also got ETS, which you might have heard of before. And that stands for exchange traded funds. So exchange traded funds tend to track a market. So you might have the New York Stock Exchange or you might have the London Stock Exchange,

for example, and it might just track the said economy or said market. When you say track, you mean just, I'm trying to simplify it. When you say track, you mean like go up the percent, the same percent. that that is going up. Yes. Essentially. Yeah. So essentially, let's say if or let's say, for example, so there's loads different types of ETFs and index funds,

but a big popular one is the S&P 500, for example, and I hate the fact that I've had to say it. But people would love that investment because there's so many finance pros that love to rave about it. But the S&P 500 tracks the American stock market. And that tracks the 500 largest US companies. So essentially, if all 500 companies are doing really, really well, then you would see an upward growth in that ETF value.

and then also that value will then correspond with the, I guess, the capital gains you then make as an investor. So that's just a US example, but you've got the Futsi 250 or the Futsi 100, which is the UK stock market. So again, if you wanted just to invest in the UK, you can, you can invest in the US, you've got Asian markets, you've got, yeah, so many markets. But if you wanted to get started, firstly, I would say, to open up a stocks and shares, ISA, actually even before that, decide how you want to invest. because when it comes to investing, people always want to just take the advice for someone online. I think you need to think about, are you comfortable with investing yourself or do you want actually just to use a platform that does all the investing for you? So if you feel comfortable with everything I discussed today, you might want to go down DIY investing

and find a platform that can do that for you. So that's where you can then pick your index funds or your ETFs or your individual stocks and shares. And then there's platforms like AJ Bell, Hargoo's Lansdown, there's Invest Engine. and those platforms allow you to invest in all the different investments I mentioned, not cryptocurrency yet, but the other ones that we've discussed. Or as an alternative, you can use a robo advisor. So that's a platform that will do all the investing for you based on your attitude to risk. They might say to you, Faye, how risky are you feeling on a level of one to five?

You might say, I'm a level three out of five, and then they'll create this whole investment platform for you based on what you said. And there's platforms like Wealthify, there's platforms like Nutmeg, Moneybox, that will do all the investing for you if you don't feel comfortable picking your investments yourself. But once you've chosen that platform, open up your stocks and shares visor. I'm going to tell you a little personal story about my first experience with index phones. So when I discovered index funds, I made my Vanguard account. Yes.

And I had no idea how to use it properly. So every so often, or like I had a direct debit that came out every month and it went half into the S&P and then half into the FTSE because that was what I heard the finance bro was talking about. and then any extra money that I had I was like oh like at the end of the month I was like oh give that a little investor or whatever and I just used to put 50 quid in about I don't know probably about 10 to what I literally would scroll down and go put a 10 in there no you would yeah

and then it was like maybe a couple years later so I had like it was obviously they're all a lot of them are very very very similar and my boyfriend was like why are you and I hate that a man has to explain this to me I'm so, but he was like, why are you doing that? You should only really, like, three max, three max. Like, you're already, it's already quite a diverse part.

There's no reason for you to be doing. Go and dilute it even further. Then you're 10 pounds and make just 10 pence instead. When I tell you there was no education whatsoever, I just went, five of there. But I respect the fact that you tried, though, because I feel like not enough of us, and again, this isn't financial advice,

but I think not enough of us try. Yeah. Because I think when you actually do make that first leap, you actually learn on the go, you also then realize, oh, actually I'm a really good investor. Or you actually see the power of the stock market because I got my sister investing at like 19. And she started with 20 pounds. And I think the week later, she lost 20p and then she was having to go at me now. She's investing 50 pounds a month.

And she's now seeing an upward growth. And I was like, see, if only someone had told me at 19 or 20 to start investing, fair enough, I started at 22. But yeah, yeah, the power of starting young is just crazy. So I respect the fact that you started. Yeah, and also like I wasn't worse off. I think I was still better off than if I'd put it in a savings account. Even when I'm not doing this very well, I'm still better off than if that was sat in a savings account

with a not very high interest rate. So then now I only have, I think, two. But he said it's good to have one that's international. Okay. Rather than he was like, if you're going to do an ETF, have one that is don't have, or if you're going to have one or two or three, probably best not to have one in like just the US one.

because if the US market crashes, that like, diversification, exactly that. Exactly. Exactly that. And I guess if there's anyone else listening and this is not me telling you to go put your money into this investment, but you do also then have global index funds or global ETF.

So if you don't want to just put your money into one market, you have again the option to globally diversify your portfolio. And again, when it comes to investing, lots of people often say, but it's too risky, but they don't realize if you have a workplace pension, your money's being invested.

And again, that might be globally diverse. that might have US stock markets and stocks in. And so again, when we actually think about that and associate it with us investing ourselves, we need to put two and two together and be like, actually, I'm not stressing about my pension fund. And if I listen to Olli and only invest for five plus years, I shouldn't really be stressing about my investments either. Yeah, that's really, really helpful. Real estate. That's so American.

Real estate. Property. Bye. Bye. Yes. I feel like over the last few years, this has been. a little bit of a controversial one. Very big, controversy. Can you talk through the, why you're by and like maybe pros and cons? Okay, so real estate. I guess if we just put property as one umbrella, buy in terms of like first time buy, if you want to get in the property

ladder, you want to have to home to live in. I think absolutely if you can afford to buy, definitely go down that route. I think the pros of that is that you obviously, you own an asset. And yes, we still have a mortgage. We have a loan to the bank. bank, but you actually have a tangible asset. Now, I know so many people that buy cars, that buy handbags. And again, there's nothing one with it, but they're not real assets and they don't really hold value compared to if you're investing in property. But obviously, the cons of that is obviously, you know, high deposits for some areas that we live in. Some people don't love the fact that they own money to the bank. But I guess the counter argument is that

you'd have to pay money somewhere. So would you rather that money go towards a landlord? Or you're I guess owning that asset which hopefully is appreciating I'm not against or for either one personally my personal preference would be to get on the property ladder as soon as I can and I'm sure many people do have that same dream but when it comes to buying property as a landlord I think that's where the big controversy comes in because obviously there's so many bad landlords out there yeah am I going to advertise the fact that everyone should get on the property ladder and also buy second properties to be a landlord probably not but

I have seen some great landlords that have provided some great homes for people. So again, if you're in a privileged position where you can invest in property, definitely go and do so. But I don't think houses are appreciating the same level as our parents' generations. No. And I think there's a lot of people who love to be property gurus or property experts that tell you, oh, just invest 60K and say property and flip it. It's not as simple as that anymore. And I hate the fact that, you know, we're in this era of social media where people love to think that,

everything's just so easy. And for some, it has been, but it's also not for a lot of people. I know a lot of people have lost thousands of trying to flip properties or, you know, become a landlord or start a rent-to-rent business. And I'm not going to go down that route or going and do all at all. But yeah, I think there's pros and cons for both sides. But definitely if you're a first-time buy and have the dream of getting a property, definitely go for it.

I love, love investing in my family, like just popping my money in my eyes and not thinking about it. And like I, so where my house is, in North Wales. My mom and dad bought it for like 70k or something. It's insane, isn't it? Like a ridiculously low, low price, but it was like this derelict ex hotel and they did it up like and it was a nice, you know, a nice house to living. But because it was a hotel, the bottom flat was like self-contained because it was like where the owners would live and the rest of it would be like a hotel that makes it sound like, I mean a bed and breakfast that makes it sound like my house is a mansion, I don't have come down to dinner. Like it's a normal, like it's a bed and breakfast.

this. The bottom, yes, the bottom, like, basement flat was self-contained. So my mum and dad were like, oh, like, we'll rent out the bottom flat because we don't, we don't need that space. This woman came in and she gave me bad vibes the whole time. She, me and my brother were kicking our ball outside and she told, she screamed at us for kicking our ball. Like, we're children, like, you know, whatever. She basically didn't pay my dad rent for like a year. And obviously renter's rights are so, so, so, so, so, so important, passionate about that. But he spent so much money on, like, Lawyers fees because it was really hard to... Same happen to my mum.

Yeah, and it's like actually, do you know what? It's not like, I think a lot of property gurus online can make it seem like just went out. Very glamorous. And actually, you know, you're dealing with people and, you know, I don't know, that woman might have had a lot of stuff going on. You, the meaning she couldn't pay a rent, you know, I'm not going to judge on that, but you have to be prepared to deal with people who are going through tricky times and that's their living.

That's where they're living, you know? you can't just, if someone can't pay their end, just be like, right, fine, kick and go. You have to be able to accommodate people's difficulties. And, you know, actually, you have to make sure that you have the financial ability to accommodate people's difficulties. And it's one thing having a bad landlord, but there's also such things as bad renters.

Like you said, I've heard so many horror stories of people having to pay thousands in legal fees to evict people out because they're refusing to pay rent. And again, don't know if that's due to whatever issue it is, but then the financial implications of that on the landlord is big as well. And so, yeah, I think when it comes to renting out properties, I'm not anti it, but I think, yeah, pros and cons, like everything. Pros and cons, absolutely.

Financial books. Bye. Yeah, 100%. I feel like it's so important if you can to financially educate yourself. And yes, it can seem really boring. but when you start seeing your, I don't know, your portfolio going up by 20%, you're going to be, I'm so grateful I've invested five pound and a financial book. Yeah, I'm definitely for it.

And I actually have a couple of my own e-books, which I did based on the fact that, wow, if I can teach myself how to invest, I want to teach every young adult how to do the same. So, yeah, I'm definitely for financial books. Local news is in decline across Canada. And this is bad news for all of us. With less local news, noise, rumors and misinformation fill the void. and it gets harder to separate truth from fiction. That's why CBC News is putting more journalists in more places across Canada,

reporting on the ground from where you live, telling the stories that matter to all of us, because local news is big news. Choose news, not noise. CBC News. Favorites, top recommendations. Oh, okay, top one would be money, a user's guide by Law Watley. So good, 10 out of 10.

her last year and I was like I'm trying really hard not to van girl you but you're just so amazing. Obviously social media is a wild wild west when it goes to financial advice but I feel like if I like I just how I learned about investing was just a couple of YouTube videos from reliable sources and when it comes to like invest in your time or your money into financial advice I cannot emphasise enough the incredible returns you get on that advice that even you know just I think I started investing with just after a couple of YouTube videos, you know, it's like the 80-20 rule. Just by learning 20% of the information, you can get, you know, 80% of the gains and everything after that is you're getting smaller and smaller margins of returns. But just that

really, really, really good basic understanding is so, so, so important and actually quite easily accessible. Yeah, yeah. And I guess, yeah, touch you on like my second recommendation, If you really want to go down the route of investing, then Simmer & Corr's got a rebook called Girls That Invest. Yeah, amazing book as well. So there's so many. And all you have to do is literally just do with Google on Amazon. And there's so many. So many of my friends have written books now. And yeah, they're just great. They're great. So yeah. Thank you for listening. If you would like to hear the full episode with even more jam-packed knowledge, then just click the link in.

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