She's On The Money - How a Former Pro Athlete Really Manages Her Money

Episode Date: August 24, 2025

Have you ever had to say no to something you couldn’t afford... and it completely changed your life? This week’s Money Diarist has. She was literally ranked top 10 in the world as a professional athlete… while earning less than $20k a year. (Yep, you heard that right. Top 10 in the world, but that's all she was paid). Backed by her powerhouse single mum, she trained, studied, worked odd jobs, and poured everything into her sport, until the moment came to head to Europe to compete and the price tag was just too high. That no changed everything. Fast forward to today and her money story looks very different. She’s swapped early morning training for a six-figure 9–5, added a pilates side hustle and has gone through a casual financial glow-up. Fast forward to today and she’s swapped early morning training for a six-figure 9–5, added a Pilates side hustle, and gone through a casual financial glow-up. This diary has it all: the brutal truth about money in elite sport, a comeback story worth cheering for, and the reminder that your “no” today might just be what sets you up for a much bigger yes tomorrow. Ready to binge more relatable, inspiring, and downright juicy money stories? Check out our ultimate Money Diaries playlist. Listen now Join our Facebook Group AKA the ultimate support network for money advice and inspiration. Ask questions, share tips, and celebrate your wins with a like-minded crew of 300,000+. And follow us on Instagram for Q&As, bite-sized tips, daily money inspo... and relatable money memes that just get you.  Acknowledgement of Country By Nartarsha Bamblett aka Queen Acknowledgements. The advice shared on She's On The Money is general in nature and does not consider your individual circumstances. She's On The Money exists purely for educational purposes and should not be relied upon to make an investment or financial decision. If you do choose to buy a financial product, read the PDS, TMD and obtain appropriate financial advice tailored towards your needs.  Victoria Devine and She's On The Money are authorised representatives of Money Sherpa PTY LTD ABN - 321649 27708,  AFSL - 451289.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

My name is Natasha Bamblett, I'm a proud First Nations woman, and I'm here to acknowledge country. Ti, gilinyan ganya, nianakaka yao yinbina waka, nianakai nianbina yakarumja, duminyagumiga dumiga ithawaka nirawamundamun imalan. Mumu bangada boma ininyalan waka, gaunan yakarumja, wutunarana. Hello beautiful friends. We gather on the lands of the Aboriginal people. we thank acknowledge and respect the aboriginal people's land that we're gathering on today take pleasure in all the land and respect all that you see she's on the money podcast acknowledges culture country community and connections bringing you the tools

knowledge and resources for you to thrive she's on the money she's on the money hello and welcome to she's on the money the podcast that lets you be pervy about other people's money situations for educational purposes of course welcome back to another one of our money diaries episodes where i get the absolute pleasure of sitting down and having a chat with one of our She's On The Money community members all about their money story. Let's jump straight into it because this week I got a message and it sounded exactly like this. Hi, She's On The Money. I used to be a professional athlete earning $20,000 a year that was paid quarterly while juggling part-time study and casual jobs all backed by my single

income family who took on multiple mortgages to support my dream. But at the height of my career, I couldn't afford to send myself to Europe to compete. And that completely changed the trajectory of my life. Now I'm a full-time instructional designer with a Pilates side hustle, a homeowner with a growing share portfolio and an above average super. I've gone from financial stress to financial strength. It has been a wild ride. Marnie Durrest, welcome to the show. Hello. Thank you for having me. This is fun. Tell me before we even dive further into it. If I asked you to give your money habits a grade from A through to F, what grade would you be giving them? I'm going to go in kind of strong with a B plus. I think I'm very organized in my

finances. I have a pretty good cash flow system set up for each payday, which is my favorite thing. Every payday, everything sends itself automatically to where it needs to go. But I do think there's a bit of room for me to improve with budgeting on my sort of smaller day-to-day expenses. I do succumb to the cheeky impulse buy here and there. And I love eating out. So that can chew down on the on the old bank balance occasionally. Yeah, but we're just girls and sometimes we do need to eat out. So I get it. We do. I get it. So tell me a little bit more about your money story. I'm so interested. How do you become a professional athlete and what do you mean you only earn $20,000 a year? Yeah, you become a professional athlete completely by accident. You start when

you're a kid and you love it so much that you just keep going and one day you wake up and you go oh my goodness I'm I'm a professional athlete this is my job this is what I do every day and this is what I love and I get to do it and it's incredible and amazing not without some struggles on the way there though so I was just me and my mom growing up really I'm about to just tell you how absolutely wonderful my mom is good I can't wait I'm strapped in I'm ready let me know about your mom so things were kind of tough for us growing up for me growing up I knew we weren't super wealthy but my mum did a really good job of hiding the extent of kind of what our situation was like from me I absolutely never lacked anything that I needed she made sure that I had absolutely

everything that I could imagine that I would need and I got pretty serious about sport from a young age I joined my local club when I was eight and I was competing at a state level by nine so it it all happened very quickly that's kind of crazy you were obviously some kind of unicorn I like to think so I also think so guys I know what sport it is and sadly it's a pretty regular sport it's not like a shot put or like something really fancy like really exciting but also not as niche as it could have been yep just your standard run of the mill do you know what that's good that's good so tell me a bit more about your mum who sounds like an absolute legend this type of sport that you're doing obviously when you're that young starting it would require

you to have some pretty significant training as well and like sorry but at the age of nine you're not driving yourself to training like your single income family I'm assuming was driving you to sport yes absolutely my mum was early mornings in the sport that I'm in so early mornings late nights to and from school from school to training from training to school all that sort of stuff. And you're looking at expenses of like, even from that kind of young age of nine and competing at that state level, it's competition entries and expenses, it's equipment, it's nutritious meals to have a child that's both growing and doing a lot of exercise, fully fueled and healthy. And all that stuff was starting to add up. So she was already footing the bill for

all of that from when I was at such a young age. And by the time I'd gotten to 12, we were going to national championships which was you know interstate trips and flights and accommodation and all of that stuff that you can imagine you know adds up to you know five grand ten grand at a time for you know a 12 year old child to pursue their dreams so she was absolutely bending over backwards for me to make all of this work she was doing multiple jobs and you know part-time jobs that fit in around getting me to training at these absolutely obscure hours and then getting me off to school on time and being able to get back to a workplace that was flexible with that so she had all kinds of different jobs she's absolutely incredible she can do so many different

things and she's amazing she's a superhero I love her yeah she's wonderful I love this so much so tell me a bit more about your money story obviously that stuff adds up really quickly and part of this like I'm assuming this is when you became an adult you said at the height of my career I couldn't afford to send myself to Europe what was that like because that sounds heartbreaking It was really heartbreaking. I'd made my first senior level international team in 2015. That was a world championship. Jeez Louise. Yeah, it was very cool and exciting to have, you know, kind of your dreams coming true in front of you. Incredible. And at that stage, that's kind of when things start getting paid for for you. So

that was actually a little bit of financial relief before we kind of had a little bit of a bump in the road. The following year was then the trials for the Olympics in 2016. And because I'd made the team the year before, it's not expected that you're going to make the next year's team, but you're kind of, you know, in with a good chance. And the powers that be in sport are kind of preparing for you to be on this team. And they're starting to think about uniform sizing and flights and accommodation and all that sort of stuff for the potential that you will qualify for this team. And I got to the trials for that and got food poisoning the night before. No. No. What? That should be illegal.

It should be illegal. And I was so upset. I developed a real addiction to, I don't know if you've ever been to T2. I'm sure you have. Tummy tea from T2. Oh my goodness. Oh, yep. Yep. Yep. Yep. I love this for you. I mean, I don't love why you found it though, because that sounds like it sucks. What then happened? Yeah. So that meant funding gets cut because of that. You kind of don't get as many opportunities in the sport that I'm in. But guys, I had gastro, leave me alone. Yeah. Right. I'm already down. Don't kick me, please.

Sorry. Yeah. Sorry. I won't remind you. So all of our funding in our sport is kind of based on performance. So if you don't perform, you don't get cash to help. Kind of makes sense, but I'm mad about it on your behalf right now. Yeah. So that was kind of, that was the first spanner in the works, which then led to later in the year, a lot of the people that I was training with my teammates and my friends had qualified for either the Olympics or various other international events that were on later in the year and so a trip had been arranged to go to an event it's kind of like it's almost like a tour so you kind of go overseas

to one country in Europe and you compete there for a few days and then you travel to your next country and you compete there for a few days we're talking like Monaco all the great stuff so it was a European tour that sounds fun though it sounds so cool and I wish I'd gotten to go on it because it would have been amazing my teammates had a fantastic time and I was very jealous of all the Instagram pictures so of course my my mum and I couldn't manage to make that work between the two of us it was meant to be an eight-week kind of trip oh that's so much money that would have been thousands if not tens and tens of thousands of dollars so it was absolutely going to break the bank especially you said Monaco I'm sorry that is so expensive right it was crazy I was

like there's absolutely no way I can do this so that unfortunately everyone went without me and I stayed in Australia but I can't complain too much because I did get a really fantastic opportunity to go to the Australian Institute of Sport in Canberra hey that's cool but also that's not Monaco so it's not Monaco and it was the middle of July so it was oh Canberra put it on for you It was freezing. And, you know, I was from Melbourne originally. So I went up there and everyone went, oh, you're used to the cold. You're from Melbourne. It's way colder in Canberra than it is in Melbourne. Canberra is crispy. Very crispy, very fresh. Oh, my God. Well, I like how you're framing

this as well, because like, yes, you missed out. But like, I'm a very big believer that opportunities that are meant for you never miss you. And the ones that do miss you, you weren't meant to be involved in anyway. So like, it does still feel like trash, but like, I fear that it has worked out for the best. It did. It did absolutely work out for the best. And I am so grateful. I came to Canberra for eight weeks and I didn't go back. I've been here for eight years. Oh, so you live in Canberra now. So you like the crispy. Yep. So I loved it. Canberra is fantastic. Oh, look, I've got no problem with Canberra, but I have a lot of issue with cold temperatures. I'm from Tasmania. So I feel like I can empathize with having to literally defrost your windscreen to

be able to drive anywhere. But it doesn't mean I enjoyed that part of it. Very true. I also, you know, I could live without the cold. I'd love to have a beach nearby as well. I miss the beach very much. Yeah, that would be good. I feel like Canberrians, they miss out on that part because it's not like you even have a local. It's true. The nearest one's about two hours away, which is too far. No, thank you. And you literally have to leave the state. Yeah, it's not good. It's not there. So all of that happened. You now live in Canberra, but how do you come to live in Canberra? You were only meant to be there for a short period of time. Yes. So for that very short period of time, I was very fortunate that everything was covered during that time. So my meals were

covered. My rent was covered. My training expenses were covered. Absolutely every expense sort of related to my sport was taken care of for me. That could convince me to become a professional athlete, like not going to lie, like if you're going to pay for literally everything, maybe I do want to do that. The only trade-off is you have to get up at four o'clock in the morning and you've got to train for like 35 hours a week. So just, it's just work, I guess, you know, what kind of work do you want to do? That's chaotic in the nicest way possible. But like the fact that it's athletes, like girl, I'm tired already thinking about it. Like I already get out of going to the gym the three times that I plan to go each week. And you're like, oh yeah, I did 35 hours. And I'm

like, God, I can't even manage three at this point. But with kids and a full-time job, you know, I wasn't working full-time at this time. I was, you know, I was studying and training and doing odd jobs and part-time work and casual work here and there. So it's all a balance. That is very fair. So tell me about life now, because you never left, you started doing that training, but also in your letter in, you said, I'm an instructional designer and a Pilates side hustler how does that come to fruition from you know obviously working as an athlete being paid as an athlete being a full-time athlete where were the changes when did that stop and what changed? Yeah so also the changes are completely by accident lots of complete accidents in my life

have gotten me to where I've ended up so it was actually COVID that kind of spurred my kind of change in careers. So of course, 2016 Olympic trials didn't go so well. And then 2020 Olympic trials were meant to be in the middle of 2020. So we obviously all went into lockdown in March and the Olympics got postponed to 2021. That's crazy. I was getting to the ripe old age of, maybe don't tell people how old I am. You were getting to the ripe old age of being middle-aged for an athlete. I was becoming very middle-aged for an athlete. So at that time when the Olympics got postponed, I kind of went, you know, I'm ancient in my sport now. So I think now's a good time

to retire. And one of the companies that I've been working for doing sort of public speaking type work actually had a part-time job in their office coming up. And I just hit them up and said, hello, excuse me, can I please have some work? And they said, yes, you absolutely can. Here you go. Oh, thank you. That was easier than I thought it would be. It was so much easier than I had thought it would be as well. When I did get that job, I thought to myself, you know, this will be a great foot in the door one day. And it ended up absolutely being that. So I was very fortunate, especially during that tricky COVID time where work was a challenge for so many of us. Yeah. And also when you'd contributed so

much to your sport as well, I feel like athletes are so hard done by when they go, all right, well now I want kind of like a mainstream job. And you kind of have to really start from scratch because you actually don't have the experience that you need to jump into a career. But now you're doing it much older because you've spent all of this time focusing on your sport. so that's stressful. It is stressful and as much as you have so many transferable skills when you're an athlete you learn so much about resilience and you know bouncing back and so many other useful skills in the workplace like dedication and focus and you know working hard and getting a result out of it people say yeah but we want three to five years of experience in the business

area. Okay I've got it on a running track you know like I don't have the what you have. It's all just different. But that was kind of how I ended up in sort of, well, it wasn't an instructional design role then. That was also a complete accident. I have just stayed with the company and rolled into a few different positions over the time that I've been there. And this is kind of where I've landed, which has also been very fortunate and fantastic.

And the Pilates as well was something where when I decided to retire, I was like, exercise and movement has been part of my life for the last 10, 15 years. I can't just give that away. I'm going to need to have something, something related to movement in my life as well. So I threw myself straight into that at the same time, which was convenient when the job was still part time. So I had plenty of time to balance it and kind of have a nice soft transition out of sport into sort of the real world. Yeah. Okay. I love it. And as a Pilates girl, like I love a good Pilates instructor too. They like make or break the class. So I'm glad that you're here for us.

Tell me a little bit more about now what you earn. So we know you're an instructional designer. and you have a Pilates side hustle, but what kind of income does that bring in? Yeah. So my nine to five as an instructor designer gets me around about $115,000 each year. Okay. Very nice. Which is very comfortable. I feel very grateful to have that coming into my bank account each fortnight. Is that plus or including super? It is then plus a very comfortable 15% superannuation.

Okay. I love this for us. I'm glad I asked and then talk to me about Pilates. Yes. So, in my moonlighting as a Pilates teacher, I work both as a PAYG employee and also as a sole trader across different places and types of teaching. Yeah, fun. We love sole trader financial administration. Very, very fun. No, we do not. We do not. No, one out of 10 cannot recommend. But tell me what kind of income does that bring in? Each year, that brings in about $7,000. So, it brings me to about $130,000 each year all up. Hey, that's nice. What type of contribution are you making time-wise though? Because like if you're moonlighting as a Pilates instructor, but you're working nine to five,

we're doing this before work, after work, how many days a week are we doing this? I just, I need to know the pervy details. Yeah, totally. So look, it's a bit tiring. I must say I teach Pilates three days a week. I teach barre as well, actually. So it's Pilates two days a week and barre one day a week or barre if you're familiar with the Scott Morrison press conference from back in COVID. So yeah, it's around five, six, seven-ish hours a week on top of my sort of regular nine to five, which is that sort of 37 and a half hour week. And are you enjoying it most importantly? I feel like you said you really wanted to bring like a little bit of movement back into your life and I feel like that clearly is doing that. But like, do you feel like having a side hustle is

a joy or is it a bit of a slog I think it's both honestly I love it so much it's so much fun but sometimes I get to the end of my nine to five day and I just want to go home and sit on the couch and do nothing but it's such a lovely community it kind of gives energy as much as you kind of walk into the studio and you're like oh I'm tired you kind of you know you can't show your class that you're tired you have to show them that you're overjoyed to see them and that you're showing up for them and so it kind of see I knew you were a good Pilates instructor I knew it I could tell from the tone of your voice you've got to be there for your community they come for you you've got to be there for them so you've got to kind of almost fake it till you make it you put

the big smile on you bring the energy and you feel energized by the end of the class that you're teaching so I love it I love that you've kind of like gaslit yourself into having a good time that's how I feel every time I'm like I don't want to go to Pilates I can't be bothered and then I turn up and by the end of the class, my instructor has been so positive and I've moved my body and I feel a million times better. And I'm like, see, I knew I should go, but the motivation wasn't there at the start. That's exactly how it should be. I'd love that for you. That means you found a good studio and a good instructor that works for you. I have, not going to lie. Tell me now, you're a homeowner with a growing share portfolio and an above average super, which is

very fun. But those are all goals that lots of people are working towards. So tell me, what are your current goals? What are you currently working towards? Yeah. So I am a homeowner. My partner and I only just bought our first house about 18 months ago. So we've just kind of settled in and made changes and ripped out cupboards and put drawers in and all that fun stuff. So we're now aiming to be able to buy a second one without having to sell this one, which is quite a lofty goal. We're kind of on track to be in a position to do that in about four or five years time, if we keep going how we're going. Yeah. Okay. That is very exciting. Are there any other big money goals you're currently working

towards? In the back of my mind, I would love to open my own Pilates studio, but I am absolutely horrified about doing that. I'm very scared and very nervous about starting my own business, but I would love to do that one day, possibly. I totally think you could. You're already doing freelance admin. That stuff's hard. Girl, you are able to manage a full-time job and moonlighting as a Pilates and barre instructor? Come on. Maybe I'll have to dedicate a bit more structure to that goal instead of having it be lofty. Maybe I need to think about it and put some structure in place for it. But it would be so pretty. And I can tell from your tone of voice and just like how you're presenting yourself, you would be literally perfect. So I'm excited for

that. I can see that in your future. Let's go to a really quick break because after the break, I want to be talking a little bit more about this share portfolio you've been growing and you're above average super. So guys, don't go anywhere. All right, Money Dice, we are back and I get to be so pervy because you're anonymous and this is my favorite thing in the entire world. Let's talk about investments. Tell me, what does this growing share portfolio look like? Yes. So my share portfolio, actually, you know, I kind of owe this share portfolio entirely to you, Victoria, because I wouldn't even have jumped in if I hadn't started listening to the podcast. Yay. But also, I'm sorry. Sorry, you did the work. I didn't do the work. I just gave you the

platform. If you didn't want to do it, you didn't have to do it. But look at the work you did. It's true. But with knowledge comes power. Exactly. It's given me that springboard that I needed. My mum was a very, shares equals scary and risky, and we do not do that approach to investing, which up until I started listening to the podcast, I shared as well and just kind of went, no, investments, not for me. I don't do that. It was all very Wolf of Wall Street in my head, you know, crazy trading and risk. I look like the Wolf of Wall Street characters actually. So 10 out of 10. Like not the smart ones. I just would like to look like Margot Robbie.

Wouldn't we all? Yeah. So when you talk about Wolf of Wall Street, yeah, I'm in. I'm committed. So there was that kind of approach. But since listening to the pod, And so I started off with Raise and just started with Roundups to dip my toe and kind of... Didn't we all though? I feel like even I did that. It's just nice to have something that's not scary. You know, it's just a few cents and it's just kind of there.

And then you go, oh, actually, now there's $250 in there and $68 of it isn't money that I put in. It's money that I have earned back. Amazing. Do you know what? Someone sent me a screenshot of their share portfolio the other day and they were like, look at this. I have now reached over the lifetime of their share portfolio.

they've like made $50,000 in dividends. She's like, that's free money, Victoria. And I was like, yes, it is queen. 50 grand in free money. That's amazing. Insane, right? I'm very envious. I don't have quite that much. Maybe one day. Oh no, but like you're on the journey and you know what, she'd been investing a lot longer than all of us. Time in the game. That's what you need. Exactly. So tell me a bit more about this. You've graduated from Raise to what? Yes, I now have a sustainable ETF portfolio via a managed fund. Okay, queen. Also, because I like to set and forget. And I have my automatic bank transfer set up every

fortnight when my pay comes in, my money goes straight into, or my allocation of money goes straight into that account. And they're looking after all the investing for me. I don't have to worry about buying or selling anything. I just say, here's my money, please do what you need to do with it. I'm not planning on taking it out for the next, you know, 30 or 40 years until I'm planning to retire. Yes, icon. So it's just in there doing its thing. And I started, well, I started with an emergency fund when I was getting my $5,000 a year in quarterly installments as an athlete. So each time I got my quarterly installment, I'd just squirrel a little bit of it away into an account, which was slowly growing and becoming my emergency fund. And then once we

got through COVID and I'd had to dip into that for a few bits and pieces during that tricky time. But I had enough that I was like, okay, I've saved up enough in my emergency fund that I'm comfortable to take out a reasonable sum and pop it into shares. So that was actually kind of how I got started in that. Look at you go. I love that. So now tell me a bit about this above average super, because I'm not going to lie. If you had sat me down and said, look, this person's an ex athlete. They were earning 20K a year. They've sacrificed a lot for their career and their passion. What do you think their super looks like? And I'd be like, look, their super is probably not looking incredible, but you've got an above average super. How the heck does that happen?

Look, I think this is the theme of the podcast for today. A little bit accidental. However, something that I did become very conscious of was consolidating super from all of these casual jobs that I had floating around in various places and from sole trading. And I had super in all these random places. And of course, having it separated is not ideal. It's going to do a lot more for you all rolled into one place. So pretty early on, I made a very conscientious effort to make sure everything was rolled into one. And I'm also very fortunate that I've got that large super contribution coming from my full-time job. Yeah, that's nice. Which has been very lucky as well. Not luck so much. I've worked hard for the job.

Exactly. I didn't even have to correct you. You did it yourself. Good girl. Yeah. Trying to change my attitude a little bit. And are you planning on contributing more to that above and beyond? Because earlier you told us that you get like 15% superannuation, which is very, very exciting. But like, do you do above and beyond in that given you're planning on investing outside of super as well? I have started doing a little bit extra only recently. And that was because I have recently paid off my hex debt or my help debt. Hex debt shows my age a little bit, doesn't it? It's called help now. I still call it hex debt. I've even labeled bloody podcasts, hex and people message

me. They're like, what's that? And I was like, you are a baby. You're too young. I'm so sorry. I'm too old to be here. I should not be on any podcasting platforms. So very funny. Anyway, the Hex Help student debt that I had has now been paid off. Oh, good job. Which I'm super excited about. Mine's not even paid off. That's a flex. I should preface, I did choose a Bachelor of Arts,

which back in the day when I started doing it was quite a bit less expensive than a number of other degrees. So I should mention that I was fortunate in that regard. But I have, you know, been working hard and kind of working my way up the ladder in the place that I work to, you know, keep paying that off at a reasonable rate. And it took me about five years all up from graduation to pay it off. So it's not like it was overnight, but very excited to pay that off.

No, that stuff takes ages, but that is so cool. Congrats. Thank you. But it does mean that I had a little bit extra. So I've now, the amount that was going into my tax to pay that off, I've now split it in half and I pay a little bit extra tax just so that at tax time, there's something there to pay for various things that come up as things always do at tax time. And then the other little portion goes into my super.

Yeah. No, that's very cool. Very cool. I love that for you. So are you investing in any other ways? No, those are my only investments. I haven't got any property or anything like that. So it's super and raise and ETF. Now I'm going to take a stab in the dark. I don't think you've got any debt, do you? I do not. I do not have any. Well, other than the mortgage, that's a fairly sizable debt, but that doesn't count in my opinion. I have no other debt. Tell me about this mortgage. What did you purchase from? When? Where? Give us the juicy details. Yeah, sure. So we purchased a little townhouse it's a two bedroom two bathroom or two bedroom two and a half bathroom rather it's got a little powder room sort of toilet downstairs and then both the bedrooms upstairs

are actually en suites which we are very proud of oh that's nice well the guests aren't going to use the upstairs bathroom if they've got a powder room so unnecessary yeah we love a powder room I mean no one's powdering their nose anymore it's a very funny term to use for but do you know what it's better than calling it the toilet room isn't it like it sounds fancy I'm just going to the powder room. One moment, I'll just be in the powder room. I'll be right back. It makes you sound rich. You can tell people, yeah, sorry, on the weekend I was cleaning my powder room. Like that does feel rich. Makes me feel very rich. You've got three toilets in your house. That's a flex. I only had one toilet in my house growing

up. It's such a privilege, isn't it? Having more than one bathroom, especially when I live with a man and I'm not sure about anybody else who lives with a man, but it's nice to have more than one bathroom when you live with a man. Oh, a hundred percent. A hundred percent. I know exactly what you're talking about. In fact, I don't know how I grew up with another, like I had a sister growing up and my mom and my dad and we all shared one bathroom. Like I don't know how one of us didn't end up dead if I'm being honest. It's where fights start, isn't it? It's where family fights start in the bathroom. 100%. So now my husband, he can go downstairs. That's the plan. Fair. I feel like that's reasonable. So how much did you purchase this house for and when? We purchased it for

$615,000. We bought it in. It was right at the end of 2023. So we actually settled on the 23rd of December, 2023. Oh, very cool. Which was a little bit stressful. It's a stressful time to be trying to settle. I was about to say, yeah, but Merry Christmas. You settled and then got to have Christmas and you weren't stressed over Christmas because you'd already done it. Yes. It was very nice to have it off the list of stressful things at Christmas time. And do you know what that property is worth now? It's probably pretty similar at the moment. We live in a suburb where there seems to be a house for sale every other day. So we're kind of keeping an eye on the market. I don't think it will have fluctuated too much. We have made some improvements

to it. Well, in our humble opinion, we've added grass and a bit of a nice garden and we've changed out some things in the kitchen, drawers, cupboards, that kind of thing. Crimsafe, I'm a big fan of Crimsafe. Oh yes, yes. That makes me feel good. Yes. The Crimsafe's on there. So all that sort of stuff we would hope would bolster its value a little bit more. But we've only been in here for, we've been living here for about a year and a half, almost two years. So we kind of haven't kept too much of an eye on sort of where it's going. We're kind of like, let's just sit tight on it, make it ours and live in it for a few years and we'll come back and revisit. No, I totally get that. I'm just so pervy. I'm like, so do you know if it's worth any more?

Because like on the odd occasion we meet someone and they're like, yeah, it got revalued and it's like worth a squillion dollars now. And you're like, what the heck? Those stories are crazy. I'm so jealous. Well, it'll be you at some point. Don't you worry. Don't you worry. So talk to me. I feel like to go to having a full-time job with a side hustle, you're a homeowner, you've got a share portfolio, you've got very sexy super. I'm still going to argue with you about you being a B, but I want to know what do you think your best money habit is? I think the automization of absolutely everything related to finance for me is my best money habit. I'm pretty good at record keeping as well. So I get to tax time and I'm not stressed at all

because I've been keeping track of that stuff all year long. I'm ready. I love tax time. I'm like, here I am with my spreadsheet and I've got all my receipts and I've got everything that I need. Here's my list of income from various places. Here you go, Mr. Tax Accountant, please sort that out for me. Good job. Especially as a side hustler. Good job. That's very stressful. On the flip side though, what are you maybe not so good at? What's your worst money habit? I'm definitely, I've got a little bit of an impulse spending, not problem, maybe just a bit of an enthusiasm for a little impulse spend. I have a, in quote marks, emergency credit card that often gets used for a little bit of extraneous spending towards

the end of the pay cycle. It has a 20% interest rate on it though. So I'm always very stressed about getting caught out having to pay back 20% interest. So to my own credit, I'm very diligent about paying it off as soon as I get paid. Yeah. Yeah. I get that. You're kind of like, this sounded like a good idea until the reality of it reminded me that it's a terrible idea. Yes. Yes. I totally get that. Now tell me a little bit more about this B plus. Cause like, while that's still a good mark, I do feel like you're doing pretty well after having this conversation. Would you change that? If not, what's it going to take to get you to say, I think I'm an AV. Maybe I could be nice to myself and bump myself up to an A, you know,

some of that frivolous spending at times is, you know, it's not outside of my means. You know, I've taken care of everything with my automated spending. All of my bills and everything are paid for and it's bringing me joy. It's aligning with my values. So maybe I'm doing okay. Maybe I can give myself an A. Yeah. See, okay. I feel like that's good. Especially it can be quite confronting when you hear back your own money story and then you have a chat with me and I'm like, hey, yep, that's good. That's not, this is this, this is that. And then I'm like, what would it take for you to get to an A? You're like, actually, yeah, I've kind of explained an A situation haven't i yeah it's kind of it's it's good self-reflection i feel better about myself

today i love that for you no good good well it's been an absolute pleasure i wish we had so much more time to have more of a yap i feel like we get on really well but also like your story is just so interesting like also shout out to your mom she sounds like an absolute bloody legend she's amazing i love her for you like i just i wish everybody was as passionate about their parents as you are So thank you so much for coming on the show. Thank you for sharing your story. I just know that our community is going to have loved listening to this as much as I have loved the privilege of recording it.

Thank you so much for having me. It's been an absolute pleasure. I love the podcast so much. That's really fun to be involved. You are so sweet. Thank you. The advice shared on She's On The Money is general in nature and does not consider your individual circumstances.

She's on the Money exists purely for educational purposes and should not be relied upon to make an investment or financial decision. If you do choose to buy a financial product, read the PDS, TMD and obtain appropriate financial advice tailored towards your needs. Victoria Devine and She's on the Money are authorised representatives of Money Sherpa PTY LTD ABN 321 649 27708 AFSL 451 289. Thank you for watching.