Just As Well, The Women's Health Podcast - He Pretended to Love Me — Then Stole My Life Savings

Episode Date: April 28, 2026

In this powerful episode of Just As Well, Claire Sanderson speaks to Tracy Hall — author, financial wellness advocate and senior marketing leader — about the devastating romance fraud that changed her life. After meeting a man through online dating, Tracy believed she had found love with a successful finance executive. Instead, she was drawn into an elaborate deception by one of Australia’s most notorious con men, who stole her life savings. Tracy shares how trust was built, the subtle warning signs she missed, and how she rebuilt her confidence after betrayal. The conversation also explores why women need to understand their finances, how financial vulnerability can show up in any relationship, and what practical steps we can all take to protect ourselves. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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These days, the power move isn't having a big business. metallic credit card to drop on the check at a corporate launch. The real power move is leveling up your business with FedEx intelligence and accessing one of the biggest data networks powered by one of the biggest delivery networks. Level up your business with FedEx, the new power move. Hi, I'm Gemma Atkinson. And I'm Claire Sanderson, the editor-in-chief of women's health. Claire's recently recorded an episode of our podcast just as well.

Tell us about the guest. I missed it. So, Gem, I promise you, this is one of my favourite, if not my favourite episode we've done so far. And expectedly so. So I interviewed a woman called Tracy Hall. Tracy Hall is a successful, beautiful, intelligent, educated woman, very senior marketing executive companies like eBay in Australia. and she fell victim to a romance con man. Now, this is not someone who met someone online, had never met them and shared their life savings.

She went online dating because she'd been through a divorce, so she'd never done it before, met a handsome man who pertained to be doing very well for himself working in the finance sector, and he conned her out of her life savings. What, like thousands? Hundreds of thousands. Oh no.

And this woman is not a gullible woman. And her tale is a tale of caution. And I don't want to say too much more because I urge people to listen to the episode. But Tracy now campaigns to empower women to have better control of their finances. Empower us to have more knowledge of where our finances are at. her whole mantra is you don't have to have hundreds of thousands of pounds. Most of us don't. But we do have finances.

If you're employed, you have finances. Yeah, of course. But so many of us leave that to our partners. I'm one of them. I shared in the podcast that my husband entirely manages the finances in our marriage. You know, there are other things that I manage. I manage the children's school uniform and the food shopping and all that side of things. but my husband managing the finances,

so I wouldn't have a clue where everything is if something was to happen to him. And that is her point. We make ourselves vulnerable and we shouldn't. We need to have a better grip of our finances,

our money to protect us now and in the future if anything was to happen to us. Not necessarily a con man. It could literally be something... Like, it could be a divorce. It could be serious illness. It could be an accident

or it could be, you know, God forbid, partner dying but she she wants women to have a better understanding of what is going on what goes in and out of their bank account but her her story is one of caution she's written a book called the last victim it was a absolutely fascinating episode real i look forward to listening to it and please do like and subscribe to this episode um because like claire said this guest is fascinating and with the more subscribers we have the more amazing guests we can get so thank you very much and enjoy the air.

Today's guest is Tracy Hall, a financial wellness advocate, author and senior marketing leader who has worked with companies like eBay, Virgin and GoDaddy. But today we're talking about a different kind of expertise, the hard-run wisdom that comes from surviving romance, fraud and financial abuse. Tracy's book, The Last Victim, Chronicles her 16-month relationship with someone she trusted with her life savings and her journey to rebuild not just her bank account, but her sense of self. This is a conversation about red flags, resilience, and why talking about money is one of the most powerful forms of self-care. Tracy, thank you for joining me on Just as well today.

Thanks for having me, Claire. So you are all the way from Australia as well, I should say. I travelled here last week, yep. You are in London having various exciting meetings. Some may be related to the book that we have here. Your story is a shocking but fascinating tale of. of survival, if I'm honest, and how you've come out the other side. Just take us through it from the start.

Well, it was early 2016 and I'd been separated from my husband for over a year. And I was working a really big job at eBay in Sydney and had a lot of responsibility, a lot of my plate. I was getting my head around single parenting, my five-year-old. And I decided in all my wisdom that I'd like to start online dating. And of course, I'd never done that before. So, you know, took a swan dive into the Sydney dating pool. And I met a man by the name of Max Tevita.

And he was a chief investment officer for a family office, so a very high-level finance executive. And he lived in Bondi. He loved surfing. He loved running. And we met and started a relationship that lasted nearly 18 months. We took family holidays together, spent lots and lots of time together. And it wasn't until mid-July.

2017, so nearly 18 months later, that I woke up to a crime stopper's video of him being arrested outside of his Bondi Beach apartment, and his face was all blurred out. But of course, I knew without a shadow of a doubt that it was my boyfriend, Max Tevita, except it wasn't Max Tevita. It was a man by the name of Hamish McLaren, and he happens to be one of Australia's most notorious conmen. And he'd been arrested for swindling 15 victims out of $7.6 million. He stole my life savings in process. And your visceral reaction to see in that video, it was physical, wasn't it? Yeah, of course. I mean, my stomach dropped. I couldn't feel my legs, you know, that feeling when everything goes numb. And I was just watching this video and I'm thinking they've got it wrong. It's a mistake because,

you know, the headlines that were with the video were things like Bondi Businessman 47 superannuation fraud, which is our pension equivalent in Australia. And I was thinking they've got it wrong because Max is only 42, you know, because he lied about his age and everything that I was seeing just seemed so surreal and wrong. And it was in that moment that then I, you know, there was a series of events afterwards that led me to the truth. So let's take you back to the start of your relationship then. You went online, as is common. You hadn't done it before because you'd previously been married and maybe when you met your husband online dating wasn't a thing.

Wasn't a thing. So it takes guts, I think, to go online. I've never done it. So it would... I don't recommend. Well, one star. You're not an advocate for it, to be honest. You're not a five-star review.

But his profile popped up and he was this sporty, blonde, And what I think, a typical Aussie guy, you know, outdoorsy, handsome, tanned. Yep, fit, active. He looked, like, to me, he looked normal. And it was kind of slim pickings back in the day. And there were a lot of men that were sort of posing with dead animals in foreign countries. And that was their profile picks. And for me, seeing him just being really active and outdoorsy, like, he just, I guess he just looked normal.

And we connected. And it took us a while to sort of. start a conversation and when we did I just was I guess attracted to the banter he could spell properly I know the bar is pretty low when you when he used that as an indication but you know he just he just had a really great sense of humor he was super Aussie but he had this kind of corporate side to him and then we just sort of started this relationship and this this kind of back and forward online and then we eventually met and in the early days or certainly for the best part of

of your relationship there there was no talk of your money or how much you earned yes he claimed to have a successful financier job and did he boast about the trappings of that job did he you know flash the cash no not i mean not really there were there were indications of wealth so for example over the period that we were together there were five cars but the the interesting thing that about him was that he would listen and mirror back to me what he heard. So if I was a person that was impressed by that, then it would have continued to appear. But I actually used to give him shit and go, what single bachelor in Bondi needs four cars? You're a, you know, you're a jerk, like just laughing with him. And then, you know, a few weeks later, one of the cars would just disappear. And he'd say

things to me like, you know what, you're right, Trace. Like, I want to simplify my life. And I don't need that. You're right. I've been thinking about what you said. And then suddenly the cars all just disappeared. And so I don't even know who owned those cars. I don't know where they disappeared too, but they were certainly very real and very much there. I think if I had been a person who was impressed and wanted designer outfits and fancy dinners, then that would have materialized. But my lifestyle and what I value is really low key and we spent a lot of time on the beach having picnics and surfing and just he really listened to who I was as a person what my values were what my desires were and essentially he mirrored those back to me now I didn't know this at the time

I thought that's who he was but in retrospect that's what I understand it to be now so he you love sports you love exercise and outdoors did was his love about stores and triathlons are running authentic or was that something he developed to mirror you think? No, that was, I would say that was authentic. He was very active, very fit, love surfing, very, very good surfer, really encouraged me to do more surfing. We went running a lot together. He ate very well. He didn't really drink. His lifestyle was very clean and wholesome, I suppose. He was very early to bed, very early to rise. He didn't have many kind of vices in the sense of sugar or even things like that.

He was a pretty structured human, very predictable in his routine. But no, that wasn't fabricated. It was very authentic. So I guess in that sense, we really, you know, we both looked by the beach. So we loved, you know, the ocean and things like that. So how far into the relationship did the talk of your personal wealth and how he could help you, quote unquote, manage your personal wealth? start? I'd say it was subtle conversations over time. There was a lot of talk about money because

that was his line of work. So it was a lot of discussion about the investments he was making for his family office clients, what was happening in the political environment and how that was impacting the economy, the markets because he was constantly tinkering away on his Bloomberg machines. So money was a constant conversation that we would have, which was kind of refreshing because we don't really talk a lot about money generally, but it was always in the context of his expertise and his job. And it was towards the end of that year 2016. So six, seven, eight months into the relationship, he had indicated that he had knowledge of something that was happening globally. That would mean there'd be some shifts in the markets that he was going

to take advantage of for his family office clients and that he had discussed. this with his sister and brother-in-law. And then he came to me and said, you know, my sister suggested that I have this conversation with you because, you know, I know how hard you're trying and you're, you know, I want you to be financially independent and in a really strong position and, you know, all of this kind of conversation. So he started talking to me about that and then just said, look, I'm doing it for my sister and her husband. I'm doing it for the family office clients. And I said to him, but surely that's insider trading. Like I'd worked in finance.

I sort of knew these things and I knew enough. And it was almost like he had predicted that I would say that. He goes, no, I've been to my lawyer. I've had a discussion with them. And it wasn't just a fob off. It was a very detailed mansplain of why he was able to take advantage of that situation. And so it all seemed very legitimate. It all seemed very professional.

And he encouraged me to invest money. It was kind of like just whatever you can afford. Like, you know, it's just an opportunity trace. I'd love you to take advantage of it. So that's where it started. And that's after that situation. He came back to me and he said the investment did really well. You doubled your mummy.

And so did my sister. And, you know, what would you like me to do with it? Do you want me to give it back to you? And I said, oh, well, let's just sit tight for a minute. And, you know, and then I had to think about what I wanted to do with that. So that was where it started. But then it kind of went away for months. Like nothing else was discussed except there were subtle signs when I look back of grooming and coercion where he would ask me questions like, you know, how much you're paying in fees on your superannuation, your pension fund?

Now, I don't know about you, but I've never had a boyfriend or a partner. asked me about how many fees I'm paying on a financial investment. So looking back, it's odd. But at the time, because it was so much part of our conversation all the time, it didn't seem weird. And it's what he did for a living allegedly. We now know he, yeah, it was a fake job. Yeah. As far as you were concerned, he was a chief investment officer.

Yeah. And this was something he'd know about. And he, you know, he had strong opinions about, you know, financial funds and how many, how much money you pay and fees and why he, you know, you know, why they were, you know, he used to say things like they're thieves. They're thieves. Trace, they just take all your earnings in fees. And, you know, there were just conversations like this that just put little doubts into my mind

or little kind of breadcrumbs that by the time, you know, over a year later when he was, you know, doing the self-managed superannuation fund, all of those things made sense. So for people listening, because I don't know what a self-managed superannuation fund is, so this is a pension fund. Yes. And it's self-managed because you set it up. It's not a pension fund that you would pay into as part of being employed by a company. Yes.

So in Australia, ordinarily, most people would pay into a managed fund that your employer, you know, you choose which fund. And it's managed by that organisation. And that's what I had done for 22 years. So it was 22 years of every hour that I had worked that had gone into this fund. and then what you can do is if you have everything in place in the way that the regulation requires you to, you can take the money out of a fund and manage it yourself with a proper constitution and an investment strategy and there are certain documents you need. So what he did was essentially groomed and coerced me to set up this self-managed pension fund

and he provided all of the documents in conjunction with a lawyer that I signed. he took me all through them. He did, he basically was all set up legitimately. But what happened was when that money was transferred out of the managed fund into the self fund, it was going into a trading account with a trading platform. And he had provided all the documentation showing me that that trading account was in my name, all of the reports, everything. But what actually happened was he had washed that money through an account of his. So all the documentation was falsified. Every form I filled in was for nothing. Every report he gave me on the returns were all on fake letterhead and fake document. It was just such an elaborate con that just went for such a long time. Because this is a man

whom would leave your home on a morning, dressed in a suit, pertaining to go into an office in central Sydney. And you would drive together and you would get out of his car and go off to eBay. And he would drive home back to Bondi and put his board shorts on. So he made up a fictitious job. He even told you stories of employees and his boss. Sent me photos of what they ate. lunch from the office, you know, kitchen. I don't even know where these photos came from.

Probably just the internet somewhere. I don't know. But the level of detail he went into and was able to maintain that level of deceit. So every aspect of his life with you was a con, was fake. In order to get his hands on your money. Did you meet the sister or the brother-in-law or any of. of his friends or anyone from his real life? Yeah, I met his brother-in-law a few times.

I met a friend of his that he grew up with. I met his so-called CEO, his boss, who happened not to be CEO. He was very hesitant for me to meet his sister. And it was always sort of a future promise. Like, yes, we'll do that in two weekends' time. And we'd plan it and then invariably something would come up or I couldn't go or whatever happened.

So I never met his sister-in-law. And that became quite a friction point for us right towards the end because I couldn't understand why he was so hesitant for me to meet her. But his brother-in-law I met his mate he grew up with, and he must have just been absolutely crapping himself. Yeah. His name, I would say Max, and they would say Hamish, you know. But invariably we don't really say our names.

I think I've only said, I don't even think I've said Claire today. Like, you know, like it's just not something you do. But the woman who he said was his CEO, how did she introduce herself then? Because if I was having a conversation, someone was introduced to me as the CEO, I would talk to them about that, their job. So how did that conversation evolve without anyone realizing it was based on falsehoods? It was both times I met her.

It was very brief. Once was in person. just in the street, they were leaving a restaurant and I was meeting him out of an Uber. And so it was very quick, oh, hi, you know, how are you? And that was that. And then the other time was via a facetime call. They were at dinner together and they FaceTime. And, of course, I knew who she was.

So she didn't need to introduce herself because he talked about her all the time. And so he was like, oh, I'm just here at dinner with Anna and, you know, ha, ha, what are you doing? What are you eating? What's going on for you? And I was like, oh, hi, Anna, you know, how are you? And so it was just, it was sort of these brief encounters. Like, we didn't spend long. And who was she?

Did you ever get to the bottom of who she was? She was an energy healer. I'm sorry, I shouldn't laugh. I know, right? Like, I don't know where he met her. But they were sort of, I think there was some way she was involved. But I don't know if she knew she was involved. I, when I spoke to the police about it, we don't know which side of the fence she sat on

because I think she lost money to him as well. But also to the police weren't entirely sure that she wasn't completely innocent. But unfortunately, she has since passed away as his sister. So I guess they're questions that I'll never have answered. I mean, if she was an energy healer, she's not a very good one. If she can't sense bad energy coming out of every poor. I think somehow there was involvement. Yeah.

Yeah. So he eventually got his hands on 317,000 Aussie dollars. How much does that amount to him, British pounds, do you know? I think it's about 170, 180,000 pounds. And when did you, as you said, you saw the crime stoppers video. Anyone's immediate response would be that is a mistake. Don't be ridiculous. That's my boyfriend of the last year.

this is some terrible injustice. When did it dawn on you, my life savings have gone? And yes, the man whom I thought I loved and have shared my bed with and shared my life with is doesn't exist. I think it was, there were two moments in time. It was when his brother-in-law texted me. And because I had reached out to him and said, Hamish is, or Max is missing.

Like I was worried. And when he came back to me, he sent me a. message that said, Tracy, please call me urgently Chris. And then in brackets, he wrote Hamish's brother-in-law. And that's the first time I saw that it wasn't Max. And at the same time, I'm seeing the crime stoppers footage and I'm trying to piece the puzzles together. I was so discombobulated. And I was like, I called him and I said, Chris, who the fuck is Hamish? I have no idea who Hamish is. And then the detectives called me. because I had actually asked Bondi police to go and do a wellness check on him

because I hadn't heard from him in 24 hours. I thought there'd been a shark attack. I thought there'd been a surfing accident. I thought something had happened. And when I called Bondi police back and said, nothing's happened. He's been arrested. They said, yes, we know, but you need to call the detectives

because the name of the person that lives there, the age of that person, everything you told us about that person that we were doing a wellness check on, is not the person who lives in that address. And I was like, yeah, it is. Anyway, then I had to talk to the detectives who arrested him, and that's when they told me. And then I spent the next few hours at the police station.

And it was in the weeks after that I realized that everything was gone. Can I take you back to his brother-in-law when you rang him and said, Who is Hamish? How did he respond? He said, what do you mean? Hamish Watson, Hamish McLaren, because he had two different surnames. And I said, who is Matt? Max, who is Max Teveda? And he said, I don't know.

And then he just, everything went silent after that. He got off the phone pretty quickly. So he knew that he'd been duped as well? No, I think he knew that Hamish was up to his old tricks. But he didn't want to have a conversation with me about it. So you spoke to the detectives and you found out that you were one of many and that your money was missing, if not gone forever. You've never recovered any of your money and nor have any of his victims.

And there's some estimations that it could be to the tune of $60 million. So he's ruined many, many lives. Globally. Globally. We can talk about a couple of the other victims. There is a documentary on Channel 4, the $60 million con man, which I've watched and some of his victim stories is heartbreaking. Yeah.

He took advantage of people when they were at their most vulnerable and ruined their lives. Yeah. Yeah. And people who were a lot older than me, so retirees, they're the ones that broke my heart the most. Because at least for me, I was in my 40s. You know, I was 42. I knew that I had another 25 years of work left in me. I could rebuild that money.

really and these were retirees that were looking down the barrel of a really comfortable retirement they had worked so hard their whole life and they went from that to not knowing how they were going to buy their groceries every week and that to me was just heartbreaking because where do you go from there when you're in your 70s you can't work you're relying on the government you've worked your whole life and he was just he didn't care he didn't care Well, he has zero empathy at all. To be able to, a sociopath, yes, to be able to do that to yourself and all those other people and not give a damn. No.

It was all for his own financial gain and this is what criminals like him do. They ingratiate themselves into your life, into your relationships, into your friendship circle, into your work circles. whatever way they need to do to get under your skin into your head and into your heart for their own financial gain, they will do it. They don't care how they get there. Because they clearly weren't any red flags

because you're an educated, smart, engaged woman. And if there had been any true red flags, I don't think we'd be sat here now, would we? But I've heard you describe it as beige flag. So in hindsight, yes, him, inquiring about how much, how many fees you're paying on your superannuation. But what other beige flags?

Maybe it's hesitance to introduce you to his family looking back. If you've been with someone for a year, you know, a natural evolve month there is to meet the sister. So he clearly didn't want you in his inner sanctum. But what are the beige flags did you see in hindsight? In hindsight, there were things like he didn't have a digital footprint. So, you know, there was nothing written. about Max Tevita on the internet, of course, because Max Tevita doesn't exist. But, you know,

in this day and age, if there is nothing about you on the internet, I would say that that is a beige flag or a red flag. Now, of course, I googled. I googled the things he told me. I looked up his name. I looked up his history. And when I couldn't find things, even if I kind of approached him with that, which I did at times, he always had a reason. He always had a reason. He always had a very long-winded explanation of why that all made perfect sense based on everything he had told me before. So my confirmation bias kicked in because I was like, oh, that's right. He told me that two weeks ago or a month ago he told me that and everything made sense. So of course it didn't, it didn't sort of feel weird to me. But looking back, if you meet someone

and they have no digital footprint, I think that's very, very odd. The fact that he, you know, I guess there was an isolation element, which is true in all types of kind of coercive control, where he, you know, we didn't spend a lot of time together because I was a single parent. I have my daughter most of the time, and that suited him, but to me it felt like he just understood there was no pressure. So it might go like 10 days or two weeks without seeing each other physically, and then we'd have a chance to spend the weekend together or a night. And I'd say, let's go out with some friends or let's, I would love you to meet my workmates or whatever. And he'd say things to me like, Trace, but I haven't seen you for 10 days or two weeks.

I've really missed you. I think it would be just really great if we could spend some time together. Now, I mean, music to my ear. You know, like there's something really beautiful about. Yeah. And I understood that and it all made sense. And so when I heard that, I thought, no, you're right. And we were building a relationship.

It wasn't like we'd been together for 10 years. So we were trying to get to know each other. And that was our very limited time that we had. But he just prayed on that. But what happened then was there was this isolation element where my friends didn't spend any time with us. So they couldn't verify the relationship. My family lived in Queensland, which is quite a long way from Sydney. His family went around and he didn't have friends.

So it really was just the two of us, which in a lot of ways, was this lovely cocoon that we were in. And if his intentions weren't so evil, it would have been really beautiful for those first few months. Because the more people he's exposed to when you're in a circle, the more chance there is, somebody will start asking questions. Because I know there have been situations where his cons have been found out.

There was one that he carried out in the UK, but I think it was the brother of the victim was suspicious of him. And he was quite well connected. so got someone at Goldman Sachs to check their records because he was claiming to work at Goldman Sachs. But that is the risk of being exposed to a wider circle that somebody knows someone and questions will be asked. So the fact that he kept you locked down in essence

is not at all romantic. It's all part of his grand controlling plan. And the other thing, you know, as much as we talked about money, money is still, in my opinion, quite a taboo subject. you know and we don't talk about how much money we earn we don't talk about where we're investing it we don't certainly talk about money we've lost and so this is what somebody like him or somebody who is conducting financial abuse or coercive control in this sense is that they prey on the fact that you won't talk about what you're doing with your money with other people and that's where that victim in the

UK was i mean it was a positive outcome because obviously they had discussed the investments together the brothers. And, you know, but for me and for most people, we don't talk about money. And so it remains in this like code of silence that is protected through the financial coercive control. And that's how it sort of just festers. Well, I think is fascinating about your story, Tracy, is that you are this beautiful, clever, educated, successful woman and it happened to you.

Now we read stories all the time about lonely women whom have given away their savings to someone they met online who they've never met in real life who professes undying love for them and somehow persuades them to transfer all their funds to them. That, to me, feels that they were gullible or to fall for that in the first place. But what happened to you could happen to anyone.

and you met a man online who was good looking, gave you no reason really at the time contemporaneously to question his status, his income, his name, his age. Why would you question those things? You take people on face value. Of course. Our natural instinct is to trust people. I don't think our natural instinct generally is to be suspicious,

although it will be after this interview. It is now. It's true. We are biologically wired to trust. Because of our primal history, if we didn't trust back in the day, we didn't survive. We needed the group. We needed that belonging. We needed to trust to survive. And those instincts have continued. And if you, I've thought a lot about trust because the price of trust that I paid was so huge. And I really wanted to understand why did I trust him so easily. And when you think about it, you go through life, okay, you go to the doctor and you don't question whether they have a medical degree. You don't ask to see their qualification. You hop on an airplane. You don't swing left into the cockpit and breathalize the pilots. You

trust they haven't been drinking. You trust that people driving on the road know the rules in the same way that you do. There are all these invisible contracts of trust because the world, wouldn't operate if we didn't trust. We have to trust. But it is the weaponization of trust, especially in this digital environment that we're in, that means that those kind of primal instincts that we have to trust what some would call blindly, they're taken advantage of and they're weaponized. And I never thought this would happen to me. Never. I never imagined that somebody like me, I just, it just never, those stories never related to me and that's why I felt so passionately about writing the book and showing how layered and insidious this crime is for many

people that occurs to. And, you know, that, that is why that I wrote the book because I never thought it would be and most of us never think it's going to happen to us until it does. So you now spend a lot of your time, empowered. women to take control of their finances because you don't have to have $317,000 or $150,000, which most of us don't, to be taken advantage of. You can, as women, generally, is it too much of a generalisation? Say we're not confident around our finances? Okay, I'll talk about my own situation.

I'm married, I've been married to my husband for 15 years. We both work full-time in very senior jobs in the media. As a result, our incomes are more than adequate. I have no idea where my pension is. I have no idea what's in our savings. I know I've got an ICER, but I've got no idea. And I feel like an idiot admitting all this, but, you know, you've shared, so I'll share.

I do not even know what day the month I get paid or how much goes into my bank account because we carved out roles when we got married that he would sort out all the finances and by the way it served us well I don't think we'd be where we are in the home ownership and stuff if he wasn't organised you know but and I

I'm the practical one in terms of the kids like if it wasn't for me the kids would not have school uniform new shoes and be fed you know we've carved out fairly traditional roles I suppose considering we both have very senior jobs in the media but

I have no idea about my finances no and it's because I was terrible with money when he met me. And the agreement was, I'll take control of the finances if we're going to get married. And I was like, thank God, someone take control. But I've left myself so vulnerable. Yeah. Yeah. And I don't think my situation is uncommon. I was just going to say, I hear stories like this all the time. And when you're in a partnership, it is normal to divide task and, you know, based on your skills or, you know, your strengths. I think what I say to women is, you know, you can outsource the execution, but don't outsource the education,

you know, because you don't have to lose your life savings to a con man to be financially vulnerable. If your partner dies, if you go through an unexpected divorce, a major illness, a natural disaster, you know, how do you cope in that situation if you're not on top of your money? And I'm not embarrassed to admit that even though I was sort of, you know, single at the time when I met Hamish, I knew there were all these things I had to do from future financial me, but they always fell to the bottom of my to-do list because I was so stretched. I was working 15 nowadays. I was single parenting a five-year-old.

I was trying to be a good friend, a good daughter, a good, you know, there were all the things. And I thought, you know what, I'll take care of that another day. I never prioritized it. And I never took the agency I needed to take to ensure that I was secure. And had I have done that, I can almost guarantee that this wouldn't have happened to me. You know, there would have been some other levels of coercion and control. And, you know, I was in love with him. I had my rose-colored glasses on, so I didn't see any flags.

I just, you know. So I always want to stress that it doesn't have to be an extreme situation like this. It can just be through life, you know. And this situation happened to my mum. dad died very suddenly when my mom and dad were 53 so not that much older than I am now and my mom or very traditional roles dad took care of the big stuff mom did the monthly budgets and looked after us kids and when he died it was really hard for her to get her head around how she was going to unlock $10,000 for the funeral and she's doing that while she's grieving now that's vulnerability you know

she didn't know all of those, you know, bits of information because they had divided and conquered. And so I think it's important for women especially to just at least lean in, at least take some agency because we don't know what's around the corner. You don't know what's going to happen. And in most cases, it will work out well. But if it doesn't, you have to be prepared and you don't want to be in that situation where you're like, holy shit, what do I do? Or where is everything at?

or how am I going to pay for the groceries this week? So, yeah. And what's the first, say, top three tips that women should do to lean in? Very simple steps. Because if you're someone like me who is completely financially illiterate almost, I've got no idea how, where to start. What's the first three things I should do when I go home tonight? Have a conversation with your partner and say, I want to understand, you know,

having that curious, you know, thought in the first place to say, okay, and I mean, this might seem a bit morbid, but, you know, thinking about it in your head and going, if something happened to my husband, would I know where everything's at? Do I have the logins? No. Do I know the passwords? You know, and so I was doing this talk one day, and this is a great example of what you could do. And it was this woman and she was sitting in the front row and she put her hand up and she said, I want to tell you a story and I said, okay, and she said, my husband and I have a document in the top drawer of our office and it's called, it's titled in the unfortunate event of. And it is a document that has everything they need should one of them pass away or be in an accident or being incapacitated or lose their mind or whatever it might be. And in that document is every login.

It's where everything's at. So, and then they go back to it every six months and they just update it if they need to. But it's the document that they go to and she doesn't know everything, you know, it wasn't like she knew all the information herself. It was where she went if something happened. So maybe that's a good tip, you know, just being curious and saying, hey, can I come along to the meeting with the accountant or the financial advisor next time I really want to understand this a bit more.

I don't want to do it because we can't do everything. we've got enough on our plates. But just leaning in, taking agency around your knowledge, your understanding, follow some great influences on social media. You can learn so much in really snappy bite-sized pieces. And I think it's just having that curiosity and that feeling that you're on top of it, should something go wrong. How did you move forward from what happened to you?

Because I hold on to grudges. And if this had happened to me, I would struggle not to carry that bitterness with me forever. You must have really dug deep to move forward with joy in your life and not negativity and really holding on to a hatred because I've never met the man and I hate him. So I can only imagine the level of hate you must have felt for some time afterwards. Yeah, it's been a rollercoaster of emotions over a number of years. There's been a lot of therapy. There has been a lot of soul searching.

There's been a lot of crying. There's been depression. There's been anxiety. There's been every emotion you could possibly imagine. I think over the top of that, I am a single mom and I was 42 and I had nothing. So I desperately had to keep working and I couldn't lose my job. So that kept me going, okay, I've got to turn up. I've got to have this job.

I've got to perform and that was a really great motivation for me. And then I had my daughter, you know, and I looked at her very early on and I was an absolute mess. But I made a decision that there'd be no tears at the dinner table. She was six. How do you explain this to a six-year-old? And I looked at her and I thought, who's going to get her to school? Who is going to make her lunch every day? Who is going to get her to her activities if I'm crying.

in my bed in the fetal position all the time. So I made a decision that in front of her, I would just carry on. And whilst I think that looked like strength and resilience to a lot of people, it was pretty much just survival. But in retrospect, you know, sometimes you need things outside of yourself to get you through. And so that's what I did. And of course, children, you know, they are the centre of their own universe and they can. pull you out of your emotions pretty quickly. But late at night and early in the mornings were really difficult times for me. But at the end of the day, I had to decide, I had to decide what kind of life I wanted. And I didn't want him to win. There's something inside me that is a little

bit stopping and I thought you know what if I remain angry and bitter and um you know annoyed at the system and all of those things then he he wins and in my heart I felt like he didn't deserve to win he's a criminal he's in jail he's where he needs to be I get to live this great life I get to see the ocean every day and now I get to help companies and people understand this world in a way that no one else can. So, but that, that has taken eight and a half years, Claire. It doesn't happen overnight. There was a lot of, a lot of rocky moments, a lot of dark places.

Because he caught quite a lengthy jail sentence for financial fraud, which is quite hard to prove. Yes. And so he, is it 16 years, but it was reduced to 12. So he's due out or he can come out next year. He can apply for parole next year. Parole will be next year. And I would bet my more.

that he goes off and does this to someone else, which is terrifying for society. Well, don't let anyone access to your mortgage, but especially not him. But yes, I've spoken to forensic psychologists and people that have, you know, looked at humans like him, and they all say that it's pathological. And he will do it again. He's never had another job. This is all he's ever done. And I would like to hope there's been some level of rehabilitation, but in my heart, I don't believe it to be true.

And which is, again, why I'm so passionate about sharing not only this story, but more broadly around scams and fraud, because these people live amongst us. We are all being targeted every day and we all need to be, you know, vigilant of our money, our situations, our digital identities. So that's, that's where I'm going with it and he will do what he will do. I can't control that. So how have you managed to trust again? Have you formed another relationship? And if so, you must have your guard up to some extent about generally. But you can you trust everyone you meet?

You can't. And that must be ever more present for you than anyone. You're right. I definitely look at the world differently now. You know, I'd never come across such evil and such. deceit and betrayal that wasn't part of my world so I was shocked but I think it's fair to say the aftermath of this was was strangely not that I couldn't trust other people anymore it was that I couldn't trust myself because I had made the biggest mistake of my life letting him in

handing over my financial power I yeah I lost all confidence in myself or trust in myself or trust and faith in humanity in the world, but mostly it was about rebuilding my own sense of self, my own intuition, my own thoughts around how I looked at the world and what I let in and what I didn't. So that's been the biggest journey for me rather than trusting, sorry, trusting other people. But I definitely look at the world differently now. I look at people differently. but I do try always to remember that Hamish is an outlier. Most people are good people. Most people want the best for each other.

He's operating at the top 1% of psychopathic offenders. I was just unlucky to meet him, you know? And I remind myself of that every day because I don't want to be, I don't want to be side-eyeing everything and everyone. That's not how I want to live my life. It's not a way to live. But I am more skeptical of the world. I wouldn't say I'm more cynical.

I'm just more skeptical of things. I look at things more critically than I ever have. And I think critical thinking is something we should all, because unfortunately our emotions take over and we don't look at things as critically as we could. So they're the things that I've taken out, but I try and turn them into a positive rather than a cynical negative. If anyone listening wants to find out more information

about the work you do, They can also buy your book, The Last Victim, which is available now, but do you have a website, social media presence? Yes, so my website is tracyhall.com.com.com. And my Instagram handle is Tracy Lee Hall. And the book is Amazon's probably the easiest place to buy in the UK. I can't wait to give it to read. Well, Tracy, thank you so much for coming in today.

It's been fascinating. And I'm so glad I got to meet you. I really am. I've been enthralled this whole conversation and I'm thank you for your bravery about speaking loudly about this because maybe some would feel embarrassed. Is it unfair to say that some women would be ashamed?

Yeah, of course. I felt those things for sure. But that's what we have to. We have to shine the light back on the criminals and not on ourselves. On ourselves, yeah. Well, thanks so much for coming in to see us today. Before we go, we have some quickfire questions.

We ask all our guests, see, just a bit of fun So I'm going to come to your place in Sydney for dinner in the sunshine because it's raining in London today So I'm going to come down under and come to your house for dinner. What are you going to cook me? Make your own rice paper rolls. So we have a big platter of fresh herbs and meat and salad and then we roll our own rice paper rolls with dipping sauce. Nice. It's great.

It's very messy. It feels very healthy, which I assume that everything on Australia must be healthy. my six you go into a desert island for a year on your own and you can only take one thing what are you going to take? Wow

I take my daughter she's so much fun she would keep me entertained all year round that's a lovely question I've said to another guest and am I a bad mother for saying my kids are the last people I take

if I'm going for a year on a desert island I am not taking out either of my children Sometimes on Mother's Day, I think the best day would be just to have the day to yourself, not to be surrounded by kids. Off you go, off to Granny's. Just put me in a massage salon and I'll be happy. Coffee or wine? Coffee.

I have coffee too. And then what's one thing someone listening today can do to make themselves feel that little bit better? Sleep. Yes. Sleep is the biggest life hack on earth and we just don't lean into it. to it enough. Don't prioritize it. No.

I was an insomniac for 20 years and I hacked my sleep during COVID with an aura ring. Oh yes. And now sleep is my biggest, like, secret weapon. Yeah. Yeah.

It's good for everything. Sleep makes everything better. Life is easier when you've slept. Yes. Well, thank you so much for coming into Women's Health HQ today. I've thoroughly enjoyed meeting you.

Tracy's book is available to buy now on Amazon and I would recommend people watch the documentary on Channel 4 as well because I thought that was a brilliant watch and you get the full scale of Hamish slash

Max offending. It's shocking and they even say that there's many, many other victims worldwide who won't featured on the documentary who may have not even yet come forward. Yeah, that's right. All right, well thank you Tracy. Thank you for having me, Claire. Appreciate it. Rosen lasagna, medium power.

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