Life Uncut - Uncut with She's On The Money

Episode Date: June 14, 2021

Kicking off todays episode with a guy who got eaten by a whale and why the hell is Em Rata holding her baby like a sack of potatoes.Then sit down with the very Devine, Victoria Devine from Australia's number one finance podcast She's On The Money and talk all things finance, financial literacy, comparison culture, money in relationships, debt and the Australian dream, smashed avo on toast.This episode is brought to you by Shop Back.Follow @lifeuncutpodcast on instagram and join the facebook group to be a part of the conversation.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hi guys and welcome back to another episode of Life Uncut. I'm Laura and I'm Brittany and we are happy to be back in the driver's seat. I tell you what, some weeks I feel like I haven't recorded for weeks on end and other weeks I'm like, I swear we did this episode yesterday. It creeps up. It's the same day every week and it creeps, but you know what, it's been a long weekend just past and I just quickly want to say and give my condolences, my congratulations to every single parent out there who normally has their child in daycare on a Monday and

then they're stuck with their own kid because daycare is shut. Mondays are such a crappy day to have your kids in daycare because you always get shafted with public holidays. Well, those of us that don't have kids, we don't have that issue. Please tell me about the awesome public holiday you had and your long weekend. Yeah, we don't all have those issues. So I, guys, the time has finally come. I was about to say, if you've been following along my journey, but if you're listening,

I'm sure you've been following along my bloody journey. Anyway, you guys know that I was, or I am, heading over to see Jordan finally, and that time has come. So I am going in just a few days' time. I am running around like a chicken with its head cut off. I have so much to do we have so much to do for the podcast I feel very very disorganized and not ready for what's about to happen but I'm so excited we are always disorganized there's nothing about that sentence that should come alarming to anybody who's listening to this podcast or has

been since the beginning this is just how we roll people from day one but you know what I was just thinking this is the funniest story surely most of you have heard this by now but I was just thinking i have nothing to feel stressed and worried about after reading this story about this man in america that is a lobster diver do you know what i'm gonna say laura no this week just a few days ago wait are you coming to me with some world news right now but i'm completely i'm coming to you with the craziest most hilarious and scary world news that i have read or heard in a very long time so a man a lobster diver went lobster diving like he always does and the details are a bit sketchy but essentially he says he sort of like felt a bump

like something hit him and then everything went black and he was like for a second he's like I don't know what was going on and then he's like oh he's like oh my god I've been eaten by a shark and this is what he's saying I think I've been eaten by a shark and then he was like feeling around he couldn't feel any teeth and then he realized he was in a whale's mouth a whale ate him it's not a joke is this like pinocchio that's not pinocchio that's the they get eaten by a whale did he yeah don't you remember this okay there you go oh he might have that was a long time ago pinocchio got eaten by a whale wasn't that maybe dick or something he got eaten by a whale and no joke so he was in the whale's mouth for 40 seconds well what did he

ever stop watch out was he well if you're in a whale's mouth you'd probably count it too he reckons he was in there for 40 seconds he was feeling around and it was all smooth he thought all he could do was pray that it doesn't swallow him so he was like touching around because whales like so the way they eat the way it happened was the odds of this happening are slim to none i don't know how it's happened it's he's the most unlucky man in the world the whales opens its mouth and then just cruises for a while with an open mouth and heaps of stuff goes in there he got eaten and then he was like touching the walls of the whale's mouth and then all of a sudden after 40 seconds which he timed on his sports watch fitbit the whale breached out

of the water and started to shake its head because it obviously could feel something in there that shouldn't be in there and flung him out of his mouth and he survived and now he's just in the hospital telling a story about how he just got eaten by a whale guys if you think you had a big big weekend once again parenting your children uh yeah well i mean you're never going to stack up to the guy who got eaten by a whale anyway that was hilarious but no apart from that my long weekend because i'm going away guys this weekend i haven't seen my parents in so long and i just realized that i am a horrible child because they live four hours away like that's not an excuse and i just felt slack we went to the hunter valley i just cannot tell you how much wine and

food we ate it's actually disgusting i was at the point that i was at my last vineyard and i had to unbutton my jeans at the table it was mortifying well also like it's fine it's totally fine that you eat so much that your pants pop you just take your hair out then you wrap a hair elastic around the inside loop and then wrap it around that button and just embrace it I still do that with my jeans bless your soul you're not pregnant anymore I know what did you get up to actually I did the same well I mean I know that's a lie did not go to the hunt valley and didn't eat wine and cheese I went down to Wollongong and I also spent some time with my family I mean I haven't seen my nan in quite a while and since my grandfather passed away last year my nan moved

into a nursing home and her memory has been kind of like deteriorating over the last couple of weeks and months and I went down there over the weekend spent some time with her and the one silver lining of the whole thing is that she no longer thinks that she lives in a home she thinks that she just goes to the RSL club so she was like that's so sweet I was like how have you been she said oh it's a bit lonely at the house because your granddad's not there but I go to the RSL club a lot so she thinks that bless her she thinks that she that's where she's doing playing bingo and stuff at the RSL she's hanging out at the RSL club do you know what whatever gets you through absolutely I'm here for it so that was it it was a pretty low-key very family orientated long

weekend but I did also read something which I want to bring up and I want to talk to you about is it as funny as being in my whale okay look it's not as funny as that I'm just gonna put it out there but I think it's look it's something that made me feel a lot of conflicting feelings I had a lot of feelings so I wanted to like flesh it out with you that's what the podcast is about flesh it out hit me so some of you might have seen this and if you haven't then I'm going to give you the quick rundown m rata as in supermodel beautiful m ratajowski m ratajowski has been in the media in the last week over some backlash that she has received for posting a photo of her and her three and a half like let's go with three month old baby she has just turned 30 years old

and she posted this photo it was actually a series it was carousel of photos of her standing there in a tiny string bikini looking like wildly insane not even insane for someone who's just given birth but just like like extraterrestrial like no normal human can ever look like her before birth but she looks like that after birth yes it's actually ridiculous she's like a deity it's i don't understand she's not a real well i shouldn't say she's not a real human because then that leads into the whole conversation that i'm just about to have the problem with the picture and i'm gonna like encourage you guys to go and have a look so you know what i'm talking about so it's a photo of her standing there in this tiny string bikini looking hot af and then she

is holding her little boy kind of like he's a sack of potatoes I have seen the photo like holding him in a bit of a headlock he's sort of off to the side and like fluffing around yeah like his legs are dangling and her arm kind of like gripping around his shoulders so she's holding him close to her the little boy doesn't have any neck support and his legs are dangling and then if you flick through the photos they become progressively better it looks as though she's kind of the photos have been taken during a movement so the first photo was taken when he was dangling and then she's kind of flicking her hair in the second one and then the third photo she's reaching around to help support him and lift him up a little bit and she's posted all

three photos in a carousel firstly before we unpack it I just want to say like we do not condone mummy shaming on this podcast and I think you know there is so much guilt that's attached to being a mum already that's there's always this feeling of like I'm not doing a good enough job so I would never want to say anything or do anything that adds to somebody's feeling of that however but I'm going to say something yeah well what I'm going to say is I had a moment I saw those photos and my instant reaction was girlfriend what the fuck are you doing hold your kid properly like that thought entered my mind and that was my very first reaction to seeing those photos and then I sort of sat with it and like okay just so you guys know she has turned off comments on

the photos she was receiving thousands and thousands and thousands of comments from people saying exactly the same thing. Piers Morgan actually tweeted some things and like, oh, look, I think that Piers Morgan is pretty problematic from time to time. That's for sure. And he wrote, that's not how you hold a baby M rudder and your millions of followers shouldn't be encouraged to do the same. Happy to give you some tips if you need them, which is incredibly condescending of anyone or let alone a man to write that. My first feelings were, and my thoughts were, holy crap, what are you doing? And then I had to sit with that for a little while and I was like these photos are a moment taken in time they are one second in time

I'm sure that she's a great mom she knows how to hold a child I'm sure that's not how she holds her little boy as in the norm but I guess the thing that kind of made me feel a little bit uncomfortable and thing that made me question is like but why would you choose to post those photos on the internet why would out of all the photos that you would have with you and your child knowing that like yes it's just a moment in time but if that moment in time is not a good representation of how you hold your child normally wouldn't there be a moment where you go well maybe this isn't the right photo to post I mean this one's hard for me and not hard it's not like I'm not around kids I am around kids but I'm not a mum I haven't had a lot of time one-on-one with

newborns I know how to hold them I know they need neck support but could it be that maybe she knows that he is okay in that position or is that a position that is not okay at all for a child of four months old. It's debatable, right? Like if he's in that position for one second, yeah, he's fine. Like we readjust ourselves. Babies, of course they are fragile, but they're a hell of a lot more robust than what I think a lot of people think they are. Yes. A three month baby needs to have neck support. They cannot hold their neck up at all themselves. And that's why his neck is kind of like falling backwards a little bit. However, one second of that is not a big deal. Can I also say that he looks like a six month old? He is a big boy. That is a big boy. Look,

I can only imagine that she's posted it because I saw all the hate too and I did look at it and think oh that doesn't really look right it looks like he's just flopping around she probably didn't question it because she knows that he wasn't in danger in that second like you said if it was like a movement between positions that she was holding him she knows that he was fine so it might not have even clocked to her that she was going to receive that much backlash and the other thing that's come to mind with this as well is that this is definitely not the first time that Emrata has kind of blown up in the media since having her little boy so only three weeks after having her little boy she posted some photos on her social media and she was looking smoking like

there was nobody who has looked this ridiculously incredible three weeks postpartum and obviously like she received the thousands of comments of people being like oh my god that's amazing did you even have a baby which is the standard response to seeing someone who looks so incredible postpartum but Claire Holt who is an actress came out and said something about this and she said I try not to be a grinch on here but I really want to say something because it's annoying me if you post a picture of your completely flat stomach 10 days after having a baby and call that body positivity to me that's the same as posting a picture of the millions of dollars in your bank account and calling that success positivity Holt said this in a video posted to her Instagram

stories in March did Emrata because I remember that photo that she posted postpartum did she say in that photo that she posted it for body positivity no she didn't and this is my thing why do we want to hate her so much well this is what I want to say to this I think just because she looks incredible three weeks after having a baby that does not mean she can't post it just because a lot of other people don't bounce back to that level that doesn't mean that it's not okay for her to live her life it's still her life it's still what has happened to her body she has no control over that that's the same as somebody else that hasn't bounced back as quickly putting a photo up three weeks later and saying three weeks postpartum every single human is different

the reason we don't like her or people like that is because we are jealous we're jealous that our body doesn't look like that three weeks after pregnancy but I don't think that's a reason to go and attack someone they're holding the baby incorrectly I can see and I can reason with that a little bit more with why she's received the hate and the backlash because people love to get on their high horse for this kind of thing and also a lot of people looking at that thinking you know we need to help her protect the baby kind of thing I get that backlash more and I still when I say I get it. I'm not encouraging it. I don't think people need to go and attack the girl. I don't get when we criticize somebody for how they look after having a baby, if they look better than we

would look. I just think that's wrong. I 100% agree with you. I kind of sat with my immediate feelings after seeing this photo of the baby and Emrata. And then I did a little bit of a deep dive into some of the articles that have come out surrounding her postpartum journey. She's only been a mom for three months. She's still figuring this shit out like the rest of us. One of the things that I thought is really unfair is that just because somebody is in their postpartum period doesn't mean that they opt in to be a role model for every other person who is in their postpartum period like yes what she and the way she looks that may be unattainable but it's not necessarily unattainable for her that's how she looks do you know what I mean and it doesn't mean

that she has opted in to be a role model and I think that sometimes when we look at people who are postpartum we look at what they're putting out there there is this huge body positivity movement where we are saying hey it's okay to have cellulite it's okay to have stretch marks this is normal look at us we're liberated okay to be skinny and hot it's also okay to be skinny and hot absolutely yeah and I guess like it made me kind of reconsider my thoughts around stuff as well and knowing that my immediate reaction to that whole situation in those photos was like girlfriend what the fuck are you doing and then I had to sit with that and kind of go okay well why do you feel like this is it because you know the photo is more about her body than it is about

her loving relationship with her child yeah there's some other layers to that that made me feel uncomfortable but at the end of the day why the fuck do we care so much about somebody else's journey yeah but she for sure posted that baby photo because she looks banging that's what it's not about the baby like it's it is what it is it's not about the baby you can't even see the baby's face like he's over the back of the shoulder well she has very consciously never posted photos of her baby's face maybe the photos that she chose are very much about her body but the reality is is that her entire Instagram is about her body. Also, I think maybe that there is a whole other element to this.

The fact that she is a supermodel, the fact that her entire career has been built around the way she looks, there's another level there that maybe the majority of us can't tap into or even really understand. Well, also, she's a business owner. She owns that swimwear company that she's wearing. Does she really? Yes.

Oh, there. There you go. So she owns the swimwear company. It's her own swim line and her business is her body and her swimmers. Look, I'm not a mum. But I do find the whole chat about this really interesting. And I still do have my opinions on it, regardless of being a mum or not. And I just do think overall, we're too quick to judge sometimes. I think we need to give people the benefit of the doubt, really.

That's it. And it also made me think about myself and think about photos that I've taken. There have been plenty of times where I've taken photos with Marley or even with Lola and didn't realise in that one second when that photo was taken that the sun was shining right on their face. And so when I looked at the photos back, I was like, oh, I'm not going to post that because somebody's going to come at me and think i've got my kids out in the uv light all the time i remember you posting and correct me if i've got the details wrong but this has just hit me i

remember you posting a photo that you got backlash from with marley i think it was at icebergs you were on a balcony you and matt and there might be someone else but you also had marley and then behind you in the photo on a wall was a sign that said it was a smoking zone how have i forgotten this i don't know but i'm just well this is my mom brain this is what's happened to me my brain it's just like a porridge puddle because you were traumatized because and like i mean you tell the story but i just remember how much hate you received because you took her into a zone that was smoking there were no smokers around were there i actually cannot believe that i've brought this whole conversation about m rata to the table and then forgot my own fucking experience which is

exactly that okay so what happened was exactly what brit said molly was only three weeks old it was my very first time out of the house and we'd gone to icebergs for a lunch like i was sitting on a travel pillow I was still like in the trauma of post delivery let alone postpartum like like just give the girl some food I had some hemorrhoids like I was sitting on an ice pack and I was sitting down there having a six oysters thinking like this is my time to shine you were determined to go and have your first outing as a mum for the very first time and I was exhausted I hadn't slept anyway I wanted to just have like a cute photo with Matt and Marley and we walked down to the balcony there was nobody on the balcony and I saw a sign and in my head the sign

said no smoking like I saw I saw the sign I even saw the sign when I posted the photo and in my head it said no smoking because usually that's what it would say because yeah I don't even know that I've been to a venue except for icebergs that has like a hey smoke here sign welcome to the smoking section like that's weird for 2020 right anyway so I took the photo I posted it to Instagram and got a huge amount of backlash like I can't believe you're taking your three-week-old into a smoking zone as if you're going to take it around a bunch of people that were actually smoking and Daily Mail posted the articles as well like it was a whole thing and I felt so pathetic I felt so stupid I was like how could I have made this mistake and now that you've said

that Brit it just makes me think and I know that you guys are going to go and look at this photo of Emrata and you're going to think the same thing that I thought which is like whoa that is an interesting way of holding a baby however like the situation I had at Icebergs a photo shows one second it is a fraction in time and I don't think that we can base someone's parenting or their motherhood journey or how good they are at being a mum off one single photo and if we find ourselves doing it check yourself because like none of us are perfect mothers totally and like maybe she was having a ciggy and blowing it in his face like that's only for the long weekend guys all right before we get into our favorite section accidentally unfiltered we should

just tell you what the episode is actually about we have the very very divine i like what you did there i know thanks the very divine victoria divine as a guest today now victoria hosts the very successful podcast she's on the money i'm sure you've heard about it she has an insane facebook group like i think it's hundreds of thousands of people in the group that are all learning about finance now i know when you hear us say finance you think it's probably really boring but this is such a great episode with Victoria and the reason she's got the number one finance podcast is because she makes this podcast for millennials she dumbs down information for us and I'm not saying it's because we're dumb I'm saying it's because finance is a really really

particular topic and not everyone has the interest in it not everyone can understand it because you don't learn this stuff in school but Victoria finds a way to make it engaging make it interesting and just to give you the stuff you really need to know. P.S. She also has a book that comes out tomorrow. We've done actually a really big episode in the past called Show Me The Money, which is all about dating relationships and finances and how you go about like dividing up your finances when you're in a relationship or if you're a single gal or guy living your single life.

But this episode kind of goes into that a whole lot deeper and it also kind of just gives you a bit more financial literacy to be able to make the decisions and live the life that you want to live. But before we get into the chat with Victoria, we're gonna do accidentally unfiltered which is our favorite part of every episode brittany hit me with your story okay well i just have a quick one first that was my own accidentally unfiltered which happened last a few days ago sherry invited me up for dinner now i don't know if i said it before i'm not a very good cook i never have been a very good cook it's

not my thing i don't enjoy it i cook to survive brittany just cooks hello fresh every day hello fresh i'm not kidding that's the reason hello fresh and when it's not hello fresh it's like just toast it's like a wrap or toast but I even burn toast you came over the other day Laura I was like damn it I've had to throw my toast in the bin because I couldn't even cook it properly no the toast had been sitting in the toaster since the morning and it was the evening that's what had actually happened I walked in she was like I just threw my breakfast in the bin I've been sitting in the toaster all day oh it's one of those weeks anyway Sherry invites me up because she's a nutritionist she's a really good cook she loves it she froths it so she's always cooks

these elaborate foods so I got there to get my home cooked meal hit she asked me to do one job while she's slaving away couldn't you gonna laugh i make my specialty is just like a wrap with garlic and butter on it it's just a garlic bread on a wrap that's what i do and then i put in the oven that's all i do so she's like can you just whip up the entree which is like literally a garlic bread and i was like yes yes i can nailing it and they were like because jay as well they're both like that's you do that really well they're really encouraging of me and i'm like guys you don't have in the morning you don't have to prop me up i'll make the garlic bread so i go and get the wrap get the butter get the crushed garlic that's it it's not hard then i sprinkle some

cheese on top so I buttered it up then I put all the crushed out of the jar crushed garlic on it and then I put the cheese on it put in the oven 10 minutes later I come back I'm like fuck yeah nailed it perfect we bite into it simultaneously and I realized that I covered it in ginger it's just crushed ginger so you know that like you know like master food crushed garlics and ginger they come in the same jar I'm gonna tell you that I have those in my fridge and the ginger does not look like garlic. It does not look the same. Look, I blacked out. I don't know what happened anyway. That was really funny. I like that you keep being like, it's been a tough week. And it's like, no, it's just been a tough life. For me, it's a tough life. Okay. All right. Well,

I've got one that's been written in by a listener and here we are. It's actually a really sweet one. None of these ones today have anything to do with poo, which is a real like highlight for us. It was the first day at a new job and it was a small regional office. So only about 11 staff in the office it was lunchtime and I was starving I went and I got my lunch out of the fridge that my boyfriend had made me and I was so hungry I just started inhaling it it was really cute that he'd made it for me because it was my first day of work and he was really proud of me so I was pleasantly surprised as it was a delicious pearl couscous salad with all my favorite things it was halloumi and avocado and yummy yogurt dressing you name it my boyfriend had never made anything

so delicious or special for me before my new boss came in and looked in the fridge and then looked at me and then looked back in the fridge and said are you eating my lunch I saw that coming I looked at her and looked back at my now almost empty container before it dawned on me that I had never even taken my lunch out of my fucking bag mortified safe to say she didn't want my shitty pasta salad that my boyfriend made that had absolutely no trimmings anyway I'm still known as the girl who was the lunch stealer also of any day to do it day one of your new job like the first day you were at your boss's lunch do you know what matt's best friend this is gonna come back to bite me matt's best friend when he used to live in the uk used to steal people's lunches

i think that pisses that pisses it's not okay that is not okay he would just be like oh that looks good you want to i'll have a couple spoonfuls of that person's lunch you want i'm fucked up you've done the same no this is actually fucked up this was someone we used to work with years and years and years ago i'm not going to tell you in what department or what they did i don't even remember their name they got fired but what they were for stealing lunch no worse i mean that's a that's a fireable offense right there it is but they were a loose cannon he was so convinced that people were taking his lunch they i don't think they were i think he actually had some things going on upstairs he was so convinced that he started to bring his

lunch in put in the fridge then he would put and i'm not exaggerating a dead rat on the top of the lunch so that no one so that no one would take it because that was that i'm not kidding and then he would eat his own lunch that had had a dead rat on top of it yeah because then no one would steal lived i had dead right on anyway you're fine he's a sicko obviously when i was like really poor and i don't say i was really poor lightly like when i was like in uni and i had moved out of home and had no money and i was working in a job that paid me thirty thousand dollars a year but i was living outside of home so i had to pay rent and everything else like it was grim i recognized all of you did you from whom at the work no

Just, I wouldn't steal a whole lunch. I'd just steal a bit of a lunch. Oh, just one bite of the Sanger and put it back? Just, like, if it was, like, they'd had yogurt or something, just take a yogurt. Laura! I was young. And wild and free, guys.

And poor. At what work environment? Where were the lunches that you were stealing? Like, properly from a cafe or from, like? No, from the fridge. Oh, but, like, your work? Yeah, from, like, my stuff. And no one ever knew?

From, like, my colleagues who, like, are my friends. Oh, good friend. all right guys let's get into the interview with victoria we are lucky enough to have financial expert victoria divine on the podcast today and now look laura and i we love money let's be real i love money but that's about as much as we know about money i don't have enough money but i still really love it no but we want to know how we can get more. So we got Victoria on the pod. Victoria is a multi-award winning financial advisor who is literally transforming the way millennials think about money because all we think about is spending

it and buying avocado on toast. With a background in behavioral psychology, her own financial advisory business and a chart-topping podcast which we all know and love called She's on the Money, Victoria knows what makes millennials tick and how we should and shouldn't be spending our money. So Victoria, welcome to Life Uncut and we can't wait for you to make us millionaires. Okay, well, I hate to break it to you, but that's probably not what we're going to do today. But you know what? We can work towards it. Victoria, before we actually get started though, there's something that we do on every episode and we ask all our guests to contribute to this very special part of what makes Life Uncut, Life Uncut. Now, that is called Accidentally Unfiltered and I

would like to know what is your most embarrassing story share it with everyone so we can laugh at you together oh some of them are too embarrassing I mean the time and you know what this is really embarrassing because I was like oh tell them about so last week I'll give you two are you ready last week COVID normal now in Melbourne so like real life meetings are happening again and I've gotten so used to coming to work in my like active wear and just looking like an absolute twit like think top knot that's terrible like no bra like I've been wearing like singlets with like hoodies and like a pair of tights it's been great so the other day I came to work looking like the true me which is lululemon leggings a pair of white birkenstocks no bra a singlet and a hoodie so

that like I was somewhat in my opinion presentable right and then Jess my assistant at least they put pants on yeah sorry I can't believe I did either but turns out I didn't want to get arrested on Collins Street in the city and something I do like on the other side not just podcasting is I do run a financial advisory firm and I came to work and Jess my assistant was like cool so like are you changing and I was like for what and she's like you know at 10 a.m you've got a board meeting down the other end of the city and I was like what and she's like yeah yeah like for your finance practice like you've got to go to this like absolutely like really important board meeting it's about compliance and like you know the new foreseer rules and I was just like oh so I didn't have

time between the meetings that I had to even go to the shops and get a dress or something so I was just like do you know what if they don't accept me as who I am thought it was fine all you need is some duct tape around the boobs you can improv that bra any day of the week girl it was fine band-aids by the way is what sufficed on that day so I go to this meeting I'd hyped myself up that it'd be fine and like heaps of people would have zoomed in no it was a room full of middle aged white men in their suits and then me in my in my active wear and like it's more embarrassing because I walk in and they're like oh my god she's the one with the podcast I'm like yeah cool if you guys could just pretend you didn't see this yeah so that was really good and I had to sit there

not for one hour not for two hours but for nearly three hours of compliance training while all of these men in suits were like yes this is very important I'm like yeah okay like great do you know what's so funny is you've just literally described Laura and I to a tee like literally now this is what we look like every day of the week we look like this to the point that yesterday I had to make a conscious effort to say to Laura Laura I need to remind you we have this really big presentation coming up soon we're going to be on a panel and she's like yeah and I'm like well you need to find something to wear because all we wear is active wear and trainers I mean I was still slightly offended by that I was like I do know how to dress and go out in public it's okay

you don't have to remind me like I'm your child can you please go buy something to wear no it was both of us we both forget how to dress normally it's ridiculous that was embarrassing but arguably not the worst thing to ever happen I don't wear black right not very often so like black is forgiving for everything especially when you get your period and I was giving a presentation at a conference one time this is probably like two years ago on financial literacy and I was wearing this beautiful cream skirt that I have owned for a very long time come off stage I'm a walker like and I'm someone who like talks with my hands a lot come off stage to find that I had my period and there's no way there is no way that people didn't see the massive patch on the back of my

cream skirt I have my head in my jacket I'm so mortified for you I'm like oh my god I can't listen to this and I think it's worse because thankfully it wasn't filmed so that was good but nobody said anything like not one person like came up to me said hey babe do you know what maybe you should go change your skirt because we were staying in that hotel too why are you doing dirty no it's like hey babe you've just got some crumbs on your face and some period on your butt like you need to go check that out I mean there's a whole other conversation in this around why we shouldn't be embarrassed when we get our periods and why like you know the stigma around it needs to change there's that greater conversation here but right now i'm fucking dying but also women have a duty

to tell each other women have a duty to say look i don't know if you know but you have bled through your pants exactly and it was a beautiful silk skirt and you know how silk flows like so i clearly sat on it and then stood up so it's just like beautifully flowing anyway i think the worst part about it was i was staying in the same hotel so it would have been a really easy fix for me to pop upstairs put a new bloody outfit on and come downstairs and no nobody had the due diligence they didn't think of me they don't care about me they didn't tell me that I had bled through my skirt okay and yeah that's the most embarrassing what I love about this the most is that just before we actually started recording Victoria was saying that her producer was like are you sure you

want to go on Life Uncut like they talk about sex and they talk about they talk about other things than finance are you sure you want to do a podcast episode with them yeah we haven't said one thing about finance and here you are talking about the time that you got your public period welcome to life uncut that's hey this is what we this is how we roll baby this is just what we do best let's get into the finance questions and like this is a bit of a different pivot for us like we have done one episode in the past which is around sharing your finances in a relationship and the importance of talking about finances with your partner but we wanted to do a bit more of a greater conversation around finances with victoria because she is the expert and also how you can apply that to your

every day. So let's jump on in. And I think the very first thing I want to know from your perspective, from someone who deals with questions all day long, from people who write in across the podcast world, what is the number one question that you get asked day to day from millennials around finance? What is the biggest problem? So the biggest problem is how do I save? And then the second biggest problem is how do I invest? So I feel like there's obviously lots of other stuff around that but if we really distill down the real questions they're asking it's how do I achieve my financial goal which to me is how do I prioritize my savings because as millennials and as young women it is so hard in a you know in the age of Instagram right like watching everybody

else live their best life you kind of want to live yours as well and at the same time you really want to buy a house or go on these really big holidays but unfortunately most of that requires significant you know, let's call it sacrifice to save. And it's like, well, how do I do that and still maintain my lifestyle? You know, as Britt said before, like we want to eat our avocado toast and like, how do we maintain a brunchy lifestyle while still making sure that I'm not poor in retirement, to be honest. So do you think like we talk a lot about comparison culture and do you think comparison culture plays a massive part in the reason why we're not able to save? And maybe it is the smashed avocado toast that is, you know, holding us back from being able to reach those

financial goals huge comparison culture genuinely to me is the thief of so much joy for so many people and it's funny because we all have different values and we all have different mindsets and you know beliefs around money and we start believing that these are the things we want like we see our favorite instagram influencers buying houses and renovating homes you go well that's what i want to do and then once you get down to the crux of it so many people like oh yeah like i want to do it because that's what you do and you're like okay but like why they're like because it's what you do like okay but like why and if you can't properly tell me why you want something then more often than not it's just because you're being influenced by the world that's surrounding you and owning a

home in 2021 is hard and it is a really big financial commitment and to be honest I'm seeing a lot of millennials nowadays who just are like you know what it's too hard I'm just going to invest I'm going to create wealth in a different way that's not a priority to me it's not a financial commitment that I actually want to make and I go more power to you like it is a massive financial commitment it is something that takes significant sacrifice and it's not as easy as it was 30 50 years ago to acquire property so for me I think that comparison culture is massive and it really does play into it whether you want to admit that it's influenced you or not it's really interesting you say that and this kind of brings me back to an interview that we did a really long

time ago with Samantha Wills and it was around starting businesses and being an entrepreneur and something that she said which was like everybody feels like they need to start a small business because everybody else is doing it everybody feels like they have to have their own project that's their own business and the reality is is that there's so much that goes into having your own business that isn't just having a product that you can sell on Etsy and you've got to be really passionate about the business side of things but because we see so many people doing it and seemingly doing it in a really successful way across Instagram and social media we think we have to do that as well and I really do totally align with what you've just said in

regards to buying property and renovating I have no idea how to renovate I have no passion for renovating whatsoever and I think things like the block is a big part of the fucking problem but even Matt's like maybe we just need to buy a shitty house and renovate the house oh good idea that won't end in disaster let's do that with two babies it sounds fucking terrible but the thing about wealth and wealth creation is it's so invisible like you can't see how much money you've got in a savings account when you buy a property like yeah you might get one sexy Instagram post if you're putting a sold sign up but then the rest of it's all you being like oh my god I just bought this house in the kitchen dank like cannot get rid of the flies like it's one of those things

that you see the Dior bags and you don't see the associated debt that they're going into to potentially acquire those things. And I'm lucky to be in this space where I do have a profile as a financial advisor, which means I do have a lot of social media clients. And the amount of times I speak to smaller influencers who say, Victoria, I really need your help managing this. And I go, great, no problems. Let's set it up. And I do a lot of cash flow for them and talking to them about how to charge and whatever else. But the amount of times they come to me with personal debt because even the influencers have been trying to keep up with the Joneses and keep up with what's going on and they're like yep cool well you know I get sent so many dresses and clothes I just needed

beautiful accessories so that I could really create great content with it it's like have we all lost our brains like is that actually what we should be doing like I get having a beautiful bag and please don't get me wrong like I have a couple of really beautiful designer bags that I have worked my butt off for but it's not something that I've purchased regularly and you know I have this one bag and I'm always putting it on chairs and like I won't put it on the ground and I it's like a child to me right like I worked so hard to acquire that and I bought that when I had a really big milestone and you know what that makes me feel good about myself but I would feel terrible if people on Instagram saw that and thought oh well she has one I need one like they don't see that

that was actually a milestone thing for me. And that's, you know, something that I worked my butt off for. And I waited to purchase until after I had a house and after I definitely didn't have any debt and all of those other things. And I think that wealth generation and financial security is invisible. And that's why it's so hard to prioritize in a world where Instagram is so massive. And it's just very, very hard to swallow. And I think that it's hard to see as well, because we don't understand more often than not what is sponsored and what isn't sponsored and you know what influences have been gifted things and what hasn't been gifted like what's real and what's fake it's really hard to differentiate that at this point in time. What's it like for

you working in an industry that is so predominantly male focused finance in general attracts a lot of male attention what is it like being a female in that industry? To be honest nowadays it's not as hard as it used to be but when I first started it was definitely very challenging because it meant that I had to have a level of confidence I genuinely didn't have. I'd have to walk into rooms and like a lot of what I do obviously as a financial advisor day-to-day it's one-on-one like I get to talk to clients and I don't actually have that overloading feeling of you know middle aged white men with mediocre attitudes coming over at me and you know thinking that they're all that shit and I'm not but it's always when I go to a conference or I go to CPD because every

year I need to do a certain amount of training and education to make sure that I can still maintain my license as a financial advisor because I am legit unfortunately and it means there's a lot of work but I would go into conference rooms and they would just be full of men and you know it's not the worst thing to walk into a room full of men but it's when they go where do you work and you go I work for myself oh okay like what do you do and you'd be like I'm a financial advisor and they'd be like so who do you work with and I'd be like no no no it's me like this is my team and they're like oh okay so have you got a business partner like they could not conceptualize the idea that maybe I was just out on my own and you know I'd never given anybody the impression that

there was somebody else in the background but they'd always assume that there's no way she could have done it on her own and so I think for me that was one of the hardest things to overcome is always being like no no no I am a financial advisor and I own that practice and they're like oh okay cool like where did that come from? I think a lot of the time this kind of thing is it's not conscious I think it's subconsciously they think okay where's the business partner where's the man and they wouldn't be doing that to be detrimental towards you or anything that you have built on your sense but I feel like it's just something we all assume that one young individual on their own can't create this much success I think we all just like to think because

it makes ourselves feel better that they surely they didn't do it on their own and there is a whole lot of sexism that's heavily loaded into it I mean I don't think that we can extrapolate that entirely like there are industries that are heavily male dominated because their content and the study of that content is what's been traditionally thought to be for men like I mean if we think about money in the history and who controls the finances in a house yeah traditionally it's the man and I think that that kind of leads me into my next question for you but it's yeah more around, do you think that men and women approach money differently still? And talk me through sort of like how we're breaking down those stereotypes around how men and women approach

money. Yeah, I do absolutely think men and women approach money differently. And it's not just me thinking it. There's research out there to say that men and women are very different when it comes to finances. And a lot of it is around our ability to take on risk. So women are much less likely to take risk than men but also women want all the facts before we make a decision so we are more than likely to feel as though we're uneducated on a topic when we know 50% of the information whereas men they know 50% they're like great I can make a decision like I'm a professional railroad ahead right like whereas you and I might go okay cool like I know I need to do x y and z but I just don't know once I've done that what the next step is so I'm not really going to take

the first step, because I don't know what the second step looks like. So women are a lot more conservative when it comes to money and saving. But I think that that's not a bad thing. But historically speaking, if we look at, you know, social media, we look at, you know, product providers, we look at banks, they've never really spoken to women. And the fact that we do want all of the information up front, and we do want to be educated, and we do actually want to feel empowered by these decisions before we actually make them and I think that that's something that I'm really trying to do in She's On The Money and that's give you the education that you genuinely feel you need to make good financial decisions because so many people talk to me every day about

okay Victoria like I'm not confident about xyz no problems I'll educate you then you can make the decision for yourself because a lot of people think that as a financial advisor my job is to just tell you what the answer is and it's kind of like well how am I going to instill long-term financial success in people if I don't teach them the things they need to know I see I'm one of those people I'm super guilty I'm the one that goes to them and I'm like hey this is what I've got can you turn into this tell me what to invest in don't ask like they'll often write to me and they'll say hey I need you to say yes or no to this and I'm like no that's why I'm paying you I was like I don't make these decisions like my brother's a financial advisor and I'm always going

to him for like under the book advice you know just family yeah good good good but he's also like brit i don't want to invest any of your money because if i lose it you're going to hold that against me and he's like whilst i don't think i will lose it i'm just going to give you the tools you need and i'm like that's not good enough tell me yes that's not what i wanted i'm like that as well i want the answers so i totally get it and to be honest when i've got clients that's easy like i can make those decisions but she's on the money is not necessarily about you know taking on new clients. It's always about teaching you how to fish instead of giving you the fish. Whereas financial advice, you know, if you went and said, look, I actually want advice, I want a financial

advisor, they should be actually just going, okay, Brit, what are your goals? How does that work? Okay, here's what we are going to do. Are you comfortable with that? And then they can manage it. So there's, to me, a really big difference between financial advice and financial literacy. And in this world, we don't actually talk about that difference. Everybody thinks that they need financial advice when they actually just need to learn how to do a budget and a financial advisor can't teach you how to spend less and I mean predominantly we could I could sit you down and be like okay Brit you are spending too much on those to your bags but I think that we also need to remember that that's actually entirely within your control you're right but once you've got all

of those savings I would help you make that decision as a financial advisor on how to invest it to create wealth and so many times people come to me like Petra I need a financial advisor and I'm like no no no let's talk what do you actually need like what's the solution here oh well actually I just have you know a small amount of personal debt I'm not good at saving it's like you don't need that you actually need someone to sit you down and just do a budget and that might be a financial counselor it might be a money coach or it might be just you know I've started an online course for this like so that you can go and teach yourself and I think that that's really powerful in itself, knowing that there's a difference between literacy and then advice, because advice

is you actually paying me for advice, whereas literacy is me teaching you the skills that you need at a baseline. So we obviously have, I mean, we have male listeners, but we would be lying if we didn't say we were predominantly a female podcast. You know, I think like 95% of our listeners are female. Yeah, absolutely. Why do you think it's so important that as women, we start taking real control over our financial decisions, over our choices, and also over the information that we know. Because Laura, we're already behind. There's already the pay gap. And unfortunately, that's going to take another hundred years at the rate that we're going to make that any closer together. We also outlive men. So we're going to live longer. So regardless of whether a man

is a financial plan for you right now, they're probably going to die before you. And at some point, if I'm being really morbid, you're going to have to manage the finances on your own. This is just a fact of life. And I'm quite blunt about these things because it's just like, OK, I know that, you know, your partner might be really wealthy or you plan to marry well or whatever it is. But like that doesn't allow you the financial freedom that you deserve. And when I say financial freedom, we're not talking about being absolutely loaded. We are talking about having the ability of choice. And that is something that not everybody is afforded. Right. So like too many times do we hear stories of domestic violence or, you know, someone's partner cheating on somebody else and then wanting to leave a situation, but money is the reason they are unable to. If you are putting yourself in a position where you are financially literate and you know how to save, you know, you've got your own little get out of jail free card fund and you're actually financially literate, nothing is going to be able to beat you down in a way. but I see too many women who are in their early 40s like late 30s early 40s who are going through

a divorce and I literally sit down with them and I go hey great like this is going on I obviously can't change that but they say they need me because you know they need the financial education and they don't even know how to log into their banking apps and I just think great if you're in a fantastic partnership and it's not your job in the relationship to manage money that's actually fine I'm not asking you to always be on top of it and you know not divvy up jobs in a relationship but I want you to be able to do those things so if push comes to shove you can stand on your own two feet yeah we have spoken about this loads and that was actually one of the things that we touched on when we did our finance episode a while back and it's so important like even if you do have

a joint income and you share everything as a couple like I really advocate for how important it is to keep some savings that are your own savings. And it's just, maybe it's so you can treat yourself, but it's also in case of a rainy day or in case something does happen and you need to leave or extract yourself for whatever reason. And I know that that's worst case scenario and it seems a bit morbid, but I think as women, it's something that we need to be really conscious of and putting all of your money and all of your finances and all of your savings together doesn't give you that flexibility if you need to leave. Exactly. And it's not just this relationship piece either, right? Like having your own and, you know, to be a bit vulgar, it's called an F-off

fund so that you can tell anything to F-off. Sorry, what was that? Yeah, look, that's what it's called, right? Like, and that's what I talk to my clients about because it feels a little bit more empowering. So you can tell any job, any person, any situation to leave if you want to. It's not just about relationships, right? It's actually, you're having a really terrible time at work you really don't want to be in that job it's impacting your mental health so significantly that you're like you know what I just want to throw the towel in I know I've got 10 grand saved that'll cover my costs until I find a new job like for so many people just having that financial freedom to say no to any situation is so empowering and knowing that you've got access to money should

you ever need it puts you in a position where you're just more confident as a person and I think that that is something we all deserve. Whilst we're on this topic about relationships and money and having different accounts what do you think about how quickly in a relationship you should start to share money? Now we've just discussed the fact that you should always keep a little fuck off account for yourself always and I'm a very big advocate for that but I also do believe in and this is just me I everyone's different but I believe in a relationship you should be also pooling money for certain things that you're going to pay for together whether that is your rent whether it is like maybe it's a fun account that you want to go and do things on

the weekend or whatever it is yeah how quickly in a relationship do you think people should start to share their money do they wait till they live together do they wait for a certain time period so interesting question and my response to that is personal finance is just that it's personal and there's no right there's no wrong so I personally I talk about this all the time on my podcast I share all of my money with my partner because we are together working towards some pretty big goals. I'm grateful that, you know, recently I've been able to purchase our first home together and it kind of just makes sense for our situation. I mean, we don't have kids yet, but I have three third children and we look after those and it's just very much an us

situation. Whereas I've got clients who are in their forties who still don't share with their husbands. They just, you know, allocate it out and they might have one joint account that they put shared resources into it's actually fine however you want to manage it there's no right or wrong like I put all my money together some people wouldn't want to do that some people go I'd never do that and to be honest it's fine the thing that I want to be clear though is communication about money so talking about it and finding a solution that works for you too so like Laura you guys might share money in a way that's different to the way you know Steve and I share money but that doesn't mean it's wrong we just need to find a solution that fits us that we both feel really

comfortable with because for some couples they're like look I'm happy sharing money but I just you know sometimes want to go out and splurge on some new shoes and I don't want to feel like that's coming out of shared accounts you go okay no problems whereas other couples they're like oh I don't want my partner seeing any of my expenses so I think it's just more about what is going to work for your personal relationship and how are you going to both contribute financially so it's equal and I guess that then leads into another topic which has come up recently and that's should couples share finances or expenses exactly 50-50 when they don't earn the same amount and I find that really interesting and I wanted to bring it up because you know your demographic is 95% women

so it's really really important to understand but for me no 50 50 isn't enough it is not good enough if your partner earns double what you do I think a more fair percentage split not just okay well rent's a thousand dollars so we pay five hundred dollars each but what if you only earn five hundred dollars a month now what your partner gets all this additional financial freedom that you're not afforded I think it's more fair to split it in a way that goes all right well I earn 30% less. So how about I pay 30% rent and you pay the 70% because that's how it's going to be fair. And we both get a level of financial autonomy that makes us feel comfortable. So for me, I'm sorry, I can't come to one specific. This is the answer. It's about communication and finding

what works for you and your relationship. I'm actually so glad you brought that up because it's something we have touched on in the past a little bit. And for me, that was a huge part of one of the breakdowns of my relationships. I was dating a guy and I'd been with him for almost four years or three years or something. And he was on a fucking good wage. Like he earned, he owned a company and he made bank, he made bank. And he loved to tell me how much money he was making yet. We still had to pay for everything 50, 50 split down the dollar. And I was struggling and the resentment built up because I was like, why am I going to work and eating cans of tuna and fucking salatas and this guy has all this savings and we're paying rent that's exorbitant

it's above my means because he wants to live in a house that I can't afford and I am constantly feeling stressed by this he wants to go out and eat nice dinners but then he also wants me to pay for them from time to time and I'm like I get that you want things to be fair in a relationship that's so important and we always advocate for that but fair doesn't like you said it's not a 50-50 split when it comes to dollars and cents my partner Jordan he plays tennis now he obviously owns more money than me but he also has a very healthy appetite and he wants to eat really good nice food and a lot of it and I'm all for that like oh mate you're paying for that I'm not paying for your organic no but we started to go out a lot right like we're eating because you know we're in the

early few months of a relationship too you want to be together all the time and I'd be like cool let's go down here and get a pasta and he'd be like oh I really want to go here which was always like sashimi and Japanese and oysters and I love this food and we're doing it for a little while and it got to the point where I said look I love this food and I love going out with you all the time but just so you know I can't do this anymore because I'm very much want to pay my way in relationships so I will always be like you got yesterday I'll get today even if deep down I'm like handing over my card and I'm like ouch yeah I still want to make sure there's this level of fairness and I was just really honest with him and I was like you know it's all about communication

I was like this is great I can't do this anymore so we need to find a way around it what if I cook you this at home. And he was really open. He's like, this is what makes me happy. And I really like to eat this. So let's continue. And I'll just pay. Yeah. Great. And that was it. We both had the conversation and I kept eating really well. Money is such a conversation where resentment starts to build. I mean, from the research that I've done and just from an article I was reading the other day, infidelity is number one, but finances are number two. Yes. I think the big thing with finances though, as a, as a pinch point in relationships is that it doesn't really rear its ugly head until you're very invested with that person. I think from the start, you can tell

if someone's like a bit of a cheapskate, but until you're in a committed relationship where you're starting to fully share your life with them, that's when finance becomes a really fucking big problem. And that's why you have to have these conversations early to make sure that you are on the same page and that you do have the same outlook, that you have the same ideas and mentality when it comes to money, because otherwise you're in a relationship for two years. And then you're like, yeah, you know what? I resent my partner because he's a tight ass. He doesn't pay for anything or he makes me pay for 50% and I'm just not happy with this situation so yeah that's why we really were looking forward to getting you on and doing this episode because as much as we talk

about relationships a lot on this podcast this is such an important part it's an unsexy part but it's a really important part of relationships as well it builds a bond as well like I think if you can be open about these things you're going to have a deeper relationship and you know what I'm so happy for literally everybody to blame me for these conversations as well I like I know they're really hard to start right like you can't just be like oh so we've been together three years and not really spoken about money and I really want to like it can be hard to bring up blame me be like so I listened to this podcast with Victoria like what a nightmare she told me that she said give me more money yeah she said that we had to do that what are your thoughts on this and I think that

you know, I hope that some people from this content start conversations that actually really impact this. And I think it's really important for us to even just give permission to our communities that fair does not equal equal, right? Like 50-50 doesn't always mean that things are fair. And I think that having those conversations, it doesn't make you less than. It doesn't make you someone who's contributing less. It just means that you want what they've got like you just want to be afforded the same opportunities and if we don't speak up we end up in situations where we are spending too much and we are in your situation Laura where you're spending every single dollar to keep up with their lifestyle and they're really

happy with it because they're paying less than what they probably should but you end up having this built-up level of resentment that genuinely shouldn't exist because if you're in a proper a partnership your partner would always want you to feel comfortable and happy and safe and if they can't afford you that grace and they can't afford that conversation with you I think you need to have a deeper conversation with yourself but just bring this back a little bit to something that we're talking about the start and then we kind of got sidetracked by talking about relationships and that's around what my period oh okay no we don't need to revisit that how's your cycle been babe where you at okay it's been pretty good yeah no I want to know about savings so I think like

one of the big hurdles that we have is our ability to be able to save you know to actually feel empowered and to look at our bank accounts and be like yeah fuck yeah I actually look there's some dollars in there again what do you recommend people do in order to really start to transform their savings okay so there's this really sexy concept called a budget right yes can you talk to be dirty about budgets finances do it in a sexy voice are you ready babe so what we're gonna do is talk about budgets but I think the most important thing to understand about a budget is it's not what you expect it to be it's not what everybody else has been telling you it is like a budget is not about you being restricted or judged for your spending to me a budget is a tool that

tells you what's coming into your account and what's leaving your account and then what you need to do with your budget is work out does that align with my values like am I actually spending in line with the things I want to achieve it's not about looking at it going oh my gosh I tap my card every single morning at Starbucks and spend like $13 that's ridiculous it's more about going wow I spend a lot on coffee am I getting the amount of joy out of that purchase as I should be given how much it is every single day and if you say yes fantastic I'm not the financial advisor that's going to argue with you over your coffee spending because Lord knows that's one of the things that sparks joy in my life

and I would literally fight someone if they said, you can't have coffee in the morning. So I'd be like, sorry, what? That's not happening. I'd rather not eat breakfast. Yeah, I'd actually rather starve. So for me, I think it's about your lifestyle and your goals and what you're trying to achieve.

And if you go, yeah, actually, I go to the cafe in the morning with my team and I just buy a coffee because they're buying coffees, like I don't actually care about it. in that case, probably do cut back because that's unnecessary spending that isn't actually adding to your life. Whereas I personally, my partner and I, that's one time that we actually get to spend together because both of us work hectic late nights. So we go to the cafe every single morning, we walk the dog down there and grab a coffee, walk back, and that's our time. If you told me that you were going to take that off me, I'd be like, wow, that's one of the things

I actually really love doing. So everybody's values are different. Everybody's spending is different, which is why I never give outlines or percentages of what you should be spending or what you should be saving. Because to be honest, if I said to you, all right, Laura, you need to be saving 20% of your income. You go, okay, no problems. I'll calculate what that means. And if by chance you're earning $50,000, 20% of your income is such a large amount of money, especially because most of us are paying rent or a mortgage or you know have overheads it's actually unobtainable whereas if you were earning half a million dollars 20% of your income my friend you should be saving much more than that so these percentages that we've always tried to historically stick to or

you know use as guides they actually end up making us feel terrible about ourselves because we're comparing somebody else's percentages to our personal situations and so I think that for us understanding your budget and then understanding what your future goal is is going to help you achieve what you're trying to achieve and not judging yourself and not comparing your spending to that of other people's is really really important and once you understand what's coming in and out of your bank accounts you can then make conscious decisions about where your money's then going to be allocated instead of oh I spend a hundred dollars on groceries a week I really need that to be $50 like really but what if you love food and you don't have an expensive gym

membership and you know you've got all these other things that you don't spend on but foods that one splurge I don't want you to feel bad because your budget's more than what somebody else's is I know for me that I started to use an app called and like guys this is not a sponsored thing I just use an app called pocketbook and it really changed how I looked at my finances and it really helped me budget because what it does and I'm sure there are a hundred apps that do this guys but it just at the end of the week or month it will literally sum up how much money you had come into your bank and how much money you had come out and then it will also categorize it into like this much was spent on food this much was spent on beauty this much was spent on living expenses and for me that

was where I was like whoa because every day I tap my card for lunch I tap it for uber eats I tap it for a coffee at the end of the month I was like I have spent thousands on things I probably didn't need to which was all just like food that was like I'm eating my my money I'm just eating it I spend more food than I think almost rent like food drinks and like coffees and brunches and stuff so that was something that actually helped me but one thing I do want to ask you because I know it's for most Australians it's our number one dream and that is to own a home because from day dot we've always been taught that you've made it once you own a home it's imperative to get into the housing market. I am starting to think more and more that it's not necessarily the only way

to accumulate wealth because we're seeing now that the market in most cities in Australia is more unattainable than ever. It is increasing exponentially, way more than inflation is, way more than anyone can keep up. Is this still something that we should all be striving for? And I know that this is a generalized answer, but are there other ways for us to start to accumulate wealth. Absolutely, there are. And it's interesting because I obviously am a financial advisor, so I talk about this every day. And recently, I actually launched a brand new podcast called The Property Playbook, which is all about property and how to buy your first home if that's a decision that you've made. But I think the most important thing for you to

understand is it's actually not for everybody. And I think people don't like when I say that because they're like, no, we should have equal opportunity. Absolutely, you do. But you also have the opportunity to say that's not in line with my values it's not in line with what I'm earning and for a lot of people if you're young and you you know have all these other financial goals to save and invest and travel and live the life you want to a property is actually going to stunt your ability to live the life you want because one saving for a deposit is massive but then mortgage repayments are on top of that and then you've got land rates and taxes and all of that stuff that people seem to forget when they're talking about oh yeah but I can afford them all

mortgage and we just forget the commitment that is necessary for a property purchase when in reality we can actually create wealth for ourselves outside of property there are heaps of different assets we can invest in and something that I've spoken about on my podcast that I feel like gets a lot of interest because what we don't understand about share investing is why we do it and you all go yeah but it's create wealth but what does that genuinely mean and you know I've got this example that I've piped out a million times but to me it's one of the most impactful and that's if you're 21 years old and you started investing $500 a month it's not that much it is hard to come up with $500 but if you started at 21 and started investing $500 a month until you retire

at the age of 65 if you'd only saved that amount you would have $240,000 in your savings account had you just saved it but if you'd invested it instead of saved it you would have 1.2 million dollars whoa you make me want to go and change everything yes and that 1.2 million dollars sounds great and so sexy like I'm telling you right now how to become a millionaire right like you think that's so great but what people think is that our super and what we're actually saving and what we're investing means that when we get to 65 we start spending it when in reality that's not what happens at all. Because the reason that money made its way to $1.2 million is because the money that you invest starts making money and then that money invests itself and then that makes

money and it compounds. So that actually means that $1.2 million when you get to retirement actually generates you a passive income of about $60,000 a year, right? So that's 60 grand a year that you'd have forever and still have your $1.2 million invested. And that's what wealth creation is. So if we want to go, all right, let's talk about what we want to do in retirement. And I've said $60,000, you might go, Victoria, that's not enough. I want $120,000 in retirement. I really want to, you know, once I pay off my home or once I, you know, get to retirement, I just want $120,000 coming in that I can spend. Cool. We're looking at an investment portfolio of $2.4 million. How are we going to get there? And that's what financial advice is. That's what we're trying

to educate you on. Because if I then said to you, hey guys, you're going to get to retirement, you're going to have a sick income, you're never going to have to worry about being able to pay bills because there'll just be cash coming in. You go, oh, so it doesn't matter if I don't have a home? No, if you don't own property, it doesn't matter because you're going to have enough income to always rent. You're always going to have enough money to put food on the table and a roof over your head and live the life that you genuinely dream to desire. If I said, all right, well, Brit, you need to start saving for your very first home and it's going to take every single dollar for the next 10 years to save for that. And then you're going to have a mortgage that you need to

pay off and you'll have that for 30 years. And then when you get to retirement, you haven't actually put aside any more money to give you that income stream. So what you end up with is just the house. You still have to work though, because you've still got to put food on the table. you can't travel because you just you want to work part-time and have a work-life balance so I think that people just immediately assume that the way to create wealth is to buy a property when in reality that's often not the case for most of us and I think that that example is really powerful because you go wait what what do you mean I could be a millionaire and it's like yeah becoming a millionaire when we are young and we have time on our side is not as hard as people

think it is but the thing that's hard is the commitment that it takes to actually do that I think one of the crazy things as well when you think about property is like yeah sure you can get the mortgage and everything else but like the fucking interest that you're paying yes you look at what the interest ends up being and you're like okay yeah sure the house costs that much but then I actually just paid a third of that the price of that house in interest if you can't pay it off quickly do not even start me I have recently bought my very first home and I had a fit the other week because my partner and I looked at our mortgage one I nearly died and fell over when I saw how much money we owe just like looking at the banking app it's like negative this amount

of money and I was like oh my gosh like I'm gonna die like I'm having an aneurysm oh my gosh we're paying like literally the amount of money that I pay in interest per month on my mortgage is the amount of money we use to pay in total for rent yeah wow what it's not okay I'm not okay it hurts my soul that's not okay this is exactly where we're at the moment when we're talking about buying a house I'm like the thought of buying in Sydney and paying off a mortgage for the rest of my life sends me into wild fits of anxiety but then this also leads me into the next thing which is debt because I think like so many of us are dealing with debt and it's not like it has to be critical debt I'm talking like so many of us have like a couple of grand stash on a credit

card or we've got a fuck ton of afterpay and all of those sorts of like prepayment apps that we're slowly paying off, but they just keep on creeping back up. I want to talk to you about how beneficial slash detrimental do you think things like afterpay are to how we're able to structure our finances? And like they were such a buzz last year and the year before, and I think everybody jumped on the bandwagon, but even personally, I know how bad that can be for somebody who's not across their savings. Exactly. And I am, again, I think you've worked out pretty quickly that I'm pretty blunt when it comes to money stuff. I don't like them. I don't like them at all. I don't advocate for them. I don't work with any of these brands because they genuinely put

the consumer in a worse off position. They don't actually care about your future mental or financial health. And for me, even their marketing is getting really tricky. Like their marketing is like, oh, use the better way to pay or, you know, buy now, pay later. And you're just like, wow, that sounds so sexy because, you know, I don't want to cough up that amount. But it's just a credit card debt dressed up as something else and they'll all say yeah but victoria we don't have any level of interest so like if you meet your repayments it's actually better for your cash flow you go no it's not because not everybody can meet those payments forever like you're making this financial commitment that it might be fifty dollars a week for the next four weeks that at the

time doesn't seem to matter but we can't predict our financial future and what if you didn't get any shifts next week and you didn't have that $50 and you know your payment bounced or something wasn't able to go through or it was in the wrong account like we end up racking up debt on these things so so quickly and it's kind of like all right I get it most fashion retails have it on their website right but the real question here is why do you need if you're planning on purchasing a $200 dress why do you need an installment why do you have to pay for it installments if you need that dress and if that's a choice that you're making let's actually put some time between us and our spending and go cool I really want a new dress I'm going to my friend's wedding

start putting that 50 bucks aside and then buy that dress because I guarantee you one your taste will probably change in that period of time because you'll go oh you're right I was just on the iconic and I just made a really short-lived decision and I really wanted to buy it right then and there. But two, you're learning to save and create good habits for yourself financially and little things that feel really easy actually put us back and don't enable us to create financial habits that are going to serve us for the long term. So for me, no, I don't love buy now, pay later schemes. But as businesses, they're genius, right? They manage to make millions of dollars each year and the businesses themselves are worth close to a billion dollars. But as consumers and

as women, we really should be wary of these things because they are a slippery slope of getting yourself into debt. But on that, just, I don't know if this is a myth or not, but we've always been told that using Afterpay and ZipPay and all these installment payments can really affect your credit score. So when all of a sudden we're like, oh, if you've been using Afterpay for this long and you go to buy a house, they'll look at your credit score and you'll be told no. Is that a myth or is this, there is some, no pun intended, but is there some credit to that? Do not start me on this. So one of the biggest Buy Now Pay Later companies is currently using a Mythbusters marketing. It's their current marketing campaign, right? And they're like,

this Buy Now Pay Later app doesn't impact your credit score. They're not wrong. It does not impact your credit score if you use it properly. Nothing will go in your credit score at all. Credit scores are reflective of bad credit history. So if you actually miss a payment or you go into debt with them, then it's going to turn up on your credit score. But when we go for mortgages in 2021, you don't just go, hey, my credit score's X and give me a mortgage. Banks actually audit your last three months worth of buying and they look at all your bank statements and they look at your credit history. They're able to find out what credit cards you have had, what loan inquiries you have done, what's going on with your personal finances.

and when they see things like buy now pay later schemes and repayments coming up on your bank statement they look at it and they go right well she can't manage her cash flow she's not a good candidate for me to lend money to because if she can't manage her finances well enough to actually buy dresses or buy things that are usually discretionary and discretionary things are things we don't necessarily need then why would I give her a mortgage even if she has got the savings and we see this time and time again because I own a mortgage broking business as well so I'm not just talking to you guys from the point of view where I'm like oh yeah I've heard about it because I have a podcast like I'm a legit financial advisor I own a mortgage broking company and I

can unequivocally say I have had clients denied mortgages because they have had bad spending habits or they've had too much uber eats that's another one that my guilty yeah but I've seen it come up where you know the bank's like oh their spending habits are wild like they clearly have the savings but over the last three months like especially during COVID they've been really lax so we're not comfortable servicing them we just don't want to extend an offer and you go oh okay so one of my biggest things is if you are at a point where you are planning on buying a home and you're going for a mortgage do three months worth of perfect spending like get rid of your buy now pay later scheme start really making sure that you're making clear deposits to your savings

accounts you know make less discretionary spend so when the lender looks into your bank history and your spending history they go wow Brit's pretty responsible you can see on here for the last three months she's put money into savings she doesn't spend excessively on Uber Eats she's not using buy now pay later schemes and you are more likely to look like a sexy candidate to a lender and I think that that's really important as well because these buy now pay later schemes they say oh it doesn't impact your credit history you're like you're right it doesn't if I use it responsibly but credit history isn't the only thing that a bank takes into consideration and that's such an it's just an education thing isn't it because I know for me I have only I'm really

good with credit cards like I've never had a credit card bill because I've been good with just using money that I have yeah but one thing I didn't know and I've always been guilty of was I always had the money in the bank in my younger years but when I went to purchase something I used after pay the money was there but in my mind it was like cool if it's not affecting anything it makes me feel better not seeing this lump sum go out at once and I just think it's an education thing we don't realize how that's going to affect us down the track so I think that's really important for people to know now that if you are like me and you had the money but it made you feel a little bit better to see larger sums in your bank for longer just really rethink that if you're

going to buy it anyway like you said just purchase it now so that one day when you want to go get your loan, there's nothing that's going to stop you from doing that. But also, I think the question there is then, okay, well, if you didn't want the money to go out of the bank more than you wanted that dress or those shoes, like, should you really be making that decision in the first place? Like, if you want to keep that $200 in your account more than you want the dress, I think you really should be considering that as something that's actually positive and a really good money habit. Whereas buy now, pay later schemes and, you know, companies are enabling you to go, oh, it doesn't matter it's only $50 now instead of the full $200 and you go oh that makes me feel

better but in reality you're not better off financially you just feel better in that moment and I think making decisions you really need to consider whether it's actually benefiting you or if it's putting future you behind and I talk a lot on my podcast about really prioritizing future you because they are so special and so important and they're going to be so grateful when you have made a whole heap of great money decisions for them. And if you keep making money decisions that puts future you behind, like that's not the kindest thing you can do to yourself. And realistically, like doing things like this, I mean, any sort of like lay-by system or anything where you're taking a shortcut, but you're just then kicking your debt down the road,

doesn't actually get you in any better financial situation. I mean, I know for me, and one of the reasons why I was really stoked to get you on here is because when I started my business, I didn't know how to do a business and like I know that we're gonna have some more of these conversations coming up but I got out a credit card and was funding my business via credit card because I didn't fucking know what else to do I need a cash flow I didn't have investors and I ended up just buying stock on credit and then hoping to sell it and it was a not how you start a business and I'm gonna come out and say that first off guys but I got myself into a situation where all I was doing was further kicking debt down the road and just paying off the interest

on that debt and I was never actually able to get back on top of it and I think if you are ever in a position where that is all you're doing that's where the anxiety starts to come in because you get this to this point where you're like I'm never ever going to get on top of this and I think especially when it's a voluntary thing when it's like oh you're putting yourself in this position because it's over a dress or a handbag or something that's really inconsequential to your life actually the purchase at the end of the day be really mindful with that because um yeah definitely got myself into a bit of a problem with after pay as well. Be warned, my friends. We've lived it, guys. Victoria, we have so many, like so many subcategories that we wanted to talk to you about

and we do want to talk to you about, but there's literally not enough time in this episode. So we are 100% going to get you back because I feel like for us, this was just like a real overview, very basic overview where we wanted to touch on a few topics just to get the brain ticking and really try and reassess all of our own situations, but we'll definitely get you back on. but before we let you go, you have a book that is coming out tomorrow. If you're listening to this live tomorrow, which is June 16th, if you've listened in the past, that's when it's come out. Tell us about your book. Oh my gosh. I'm so excited about my book. I think the main selling point here is it's peach with gold foil. Like my publishers literally put gold foil on my book,

which obviously that means you should buy it. But for me, writing a book was so powerful because I just felt like you know I started this podcast from a place of love and I started it because I'm so wildly passionate about empowering particularly women to just take control of their financial lives and you know it never started from me going I'm gonna start a business like I was just like genuinely young and dumb and just thought oh this will be fun like podcasts are cool we feel you babe yeah not realizing the impact that we could have and it was so fun to do but then I realized the impact I was having and you know then being asked to publish a book was me going wow like this is an extension of the reach the podcast has and this opportunity to

change lives and so for me the She's On The Money book is your end-to-end guide to financial freedom and creating a financial life that you're really proud of we cover everything from money stories and reframing what your money story looks like because your money history and your money story is not your fault all the way through to budgeting and cash flow and how to invest and in fact how much money it costs to have a baby in Australia from a number of different experiences from women I've spoken to all the way through to retirement which is not as sexy but I do try to make it sound a little bit sexy but it's genuinely a book that I'm so proud of because I feel like it's one of those things that I feel like I'm gifting people and I'm just like you know what

I've written this book and if you read it it'll be everything that you need to know to make sure that you stay out of debt and you stay on the right path and you can achieve financial freedom within this lifetime. So that's what it is. Look, I did sneakily read it. I know. Yeah, I sneakily got to read it. You did. And it really is amazing. And I mean, I think the thing about you is that the reason your podcast has so much reach and has been so popular is because you do simplify things and you do make things on a level that we can all understand whether we do have that business mind or that finance mind. You make it so like you just broke down how much we could save when we go into retirement. When you break it down to something so simple, it really has so

much more effect and it's so much more powerful. So guys, if this interests you at all and you're looking to make some changes in your life or you want to buy a house or maybe you just want to go and buy those Gucci bags, read Victoria's book. And Victoria, before we go, tell everyone where else they can find you. Where's your podcast? What's your Instagram handle? So the podcast is she's on the money and hopefully you can type that into any podcasting app and find us if you can't i'm concerned then on instagram we're at she's on the money aus and if you want to find me personally i am on instagram at victoria underscore divine thank you so much for taking the time for us today victoria it's been the best oh my gosh thank you for hanging out we'll see you

again soon we will and it's exciting oh yeah stay tuned guys okay guys you know we never finish an episode without our suck in our suite our highlight and our low light of the week so laura you can kick it off this week what's your suck well my suck is that i spent the beginning of this week in hospital with lola as you guys already know especially if you listen to the last episode lola had some funky eye thing happening who i Well, it wasn't pink eye. It was ocular colitis. What was it from?

Poo. Marley gave Lola pink eye. I'm pretty sure, look, if we're going to try and figure out what happened, I reckon a pretty educated guess is that Marley stuck her finger in Lola's eye. Like if I'm just going to take a wild stab in the dark. Look, it was Marley OU, so let's hope that it was Marley. If I'm going to take a wild stab in the eye, I reckon it was Marley. So I was in the hospital for a couple of days with Lola.

Hospitals are very uncomfortable. It's just a really grim place. like it's amazing in that like the hospital staff are incredible we're at the children's hospital being there was something that's like so non-life-threatening you know something that was like pretty benign and she just needed to have antibiotics for seeing how amazing the staff was was like that's a really special thing the suite of my week is I mean the suite of my week is both my kids but Marley is her just for her vocabulary like she can say so many things now it's her birthday this weekend she's turning two and it just blows my mind how many words she can say now

and like the sass that they say it in as well and I know that anyone who's not a mom is probably just gonna be like yeah boring kid stuff but like even the other day I came home I'd just gone up to go get a coffee and I walked in the door and opened the door and she goes hey where you been you're two what do you mean where have I been also I can't believe she's two okay wait you know she said to Lola today so I call and I'm gonna stop I realize this but I call Lola like my little fatty, right? Which I know someone's going to be listening to this being like, you're going to put some deep seated trauma into your child. Stop doing it. She's four months old. She will never remember these times of her life. But I realized I can't say this because this morning

I had Lola and Marley in bed and Marley just rolls over to Lola and goes, Lola, you're fat. And I was like, I'm a terrible mother. Yes, they're vacuums. You don't even realize you say something that they listen. They pick everything up. But anyway, Marley's just like, she's just the best she's so fun okay so no more fatty lola no i can't call it no no you can't call your kid names even like endearingly because she's just so cute like the little legs and a little arms and a little belly you know just you just want to eat she's like a potato with eyes you definitely want to eat her yeah oh i want to slow cook her and put some sour cream on top too much too far no no she's not nachos okay my sack my sack is really quick and easy i ordered some

shoes online and they came in my size but they sent me men's shoes that is so annoying so they're too big. Well, they sent you your size, but men's size. Yeah. So it's too big. So I got the right size for men's. And that's really annoying because I don't have time now. I leave in four days. So like, I hate life. Just spent three days at the hospital again. Look, we cannot compare our sucks this week. We cannot. No, look, that's the worst thing that happened to me this week. And that was literally all I could think about. So I've had a pretty good week. My sweet was going to the under valley with my family I can't deny that we're a real family family so we love hanging out we're all really good friends my parents we don't look at my parents like parents they don't

look at us like kids we're all just like friends so we just had the best time we had so much laughter we ate so much we drank so much and every single time I do it I'm like I need to do this more I need to and I think with what's going on in the world too I think it's important that we do start to prioritize family and friends a little bit more I've been really slack on that behalf I just let work overwhelm me and all of a sudden six months goes past. And I think everyone will resonate with what I mean by that, where all of a sudden we're in the middle of the year. It's the middle of 2021. So I don't know. I just got really deep for a minute. Call someone and tell them you love them. I feel like this happens every year. I feel like every year, maybe it's just like that we're

getting older, but the older you get, the faster the years go and the faster we're careening towards our deaths thank you for listening to live on no I completely agree but I also think that there's going to be a lot of people out there who are listening to this who have been separated from their families in the last year or year and a half whatever it's been and as much as we want to prioritize our families there's definitely going to be people out there who aren't able to at the moment so like whatever it is zoom facetime call them text them this is your little reminder you know I think that we always get through the day and we're like oh shit I was supposed to call nan today i'll call her tomorrow oh shit i'll call her on this day and i know i do

it all the time as well so if you needed this reminder to call your nan or your mom or somebody who you love and you've been putting it off just call them send them a text and if you are still separated from your family we are we really feel for you and our thoughts are with you we hope that you do get to see them very very soon now guys if you love the episode you know the drill go leave a review subscribe jump on the facebook group which is life uncut discussion group and also follow us on instagram which is also life on top podcast and tell your mom tell your dad tell your friends and tell everyone and share the love because we love love