She's On The Money - MONEY DIARIES: A Total Game Changer!

Episode Date: May 28, 2023

Wait till you meet this game changing member of our community! She's a 29 year old Torres Straight Islander woman with 2 kids. At 23 years old, her ex left her at 8 months pregnant to pay their mortgage. But she is now in the final year of her Doctor of Medicine, she's tutoring, plus managing a side hustle all while saving for her wedding with FIFO fiancée! Acknowledgement of Country By Natarsha 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.

Hello, my name is Natasha Nabanunga-Bamblett. I'm a proud Yorta Yorta, Kernai, Wolperi and Awadjeri woman. And before we get started on She's on the Money podcast, I would like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land of which this podcast is recorded on Awadjeri country, acknowledging the elders, the ancestors and the next generation coming through. As this podcast is about connecting, empowering, knowledge sharing and the storytelling of you to make a difference for today and lasting impact for tomorrow. Let's get into it. She's on the money.

She's on the money. Hello and welcome to She's On The Money, the podcast for millennials who want financial freedom. Welcome back to another one of our money diaries where I get the privilege of talking to one of our incredible She's On The Money community members all about their journey. Let's jump straight into it because this week I got a message that went like this. Hi V, I'm a Torres Strait Islander woman who is 29 years old with two kids. I was a single mom at 23 years old after my ex left me at eight months pregnant and I had to pay our mortgage. I'm now in the final year of my doctor of medicine. My income comes from scholarships

and tutoring. I have a new side hustle making med students notes that I sell on Etsy and I'm saving for my wedding to my beautiful FIFO fiance. Money diarist, what? How good is that? You just like sell your med notes yeah yeah you're a genius I used to do that like not med notes I never did med school like so that would make no sense but I used to photocopy my notes and sell them at uni what are you doing just taking this to the 50th level by selling them online yeah so I use canva so I guess medical notes I guess there's a lot of similarities between a lot of the unis in Australia and overseas and stuff where I guess you know we get kind of given you know information about like things we need to ask patients for specific problems and so usually the uni will

just give you like a pdf it's just like a table and it's really just boring and ugly. Not that sexy. No and you basically have to memorize this and then you know in your kind of exams your clinical like tests and stuff you basically have to memorize that whole thing and ask you know the patients those questions yeah like my undergrad was in arts so I did sociology and international studies so I kind of identify a little bit artsy and yeah I just figured like I'm a very visual learner and if I was able to see these kinds of like summaries of histories and physical examinations right in front of me that were like color-coded and super pretty like it would be really good for my recall. Oh my gosh, you're a genius. Yeah, so I started making those. I just

launched last week. I've made about $100 so far. Oh my gosh, money win. Yeah, yeah. And it would like force you to study to put it in the best possible format to then sell. So you're like business making and studying at the same time. You're an actual genius. Yes, I use it as like a form of meditation as well like I have a very full-on life so when my partner's not here when he's away at work I kind of use it as kind of like a meditative practice but I'm also studying at the same time I'm obsessed yeah a week on Etsy and you've made 100 bucks that is actually really really good that never happens I know nothing about business I know nothing about any of that so I'm kind of stumbling my way through oh my gosh I am obsessed with that I feel like that

is such a good way of sharing content as well. I love it. I can't say that any of the notes that I wrote were that aesthetic, like they were literal photocopies, but that's okay. I had a little loyal client base and I no longer serve them. Yeah. Yeah. Well, hopefully this can be kind of like a long-term passive income kind of thing. Yeah. You pop it out. I feel like Etsy is so underrated. Do you know how many times I've looked at it and gone, you know what, I should be putting finance content on there because our community are always asking me for like saving hacks and templates and whatnot. And it just makes no sense for me at this point in my life to be making those and sitting down and going, okay, like, cause I just don't have time. Like I don't

have time. And if I pop it on the website for free, like it doesn't get that much traction because we don't like market it or anything. And the amount of times I get messages from people that are like, oh my God, I didn't realize you had free budget templates on your website, which by the way, free budget templates. There are savings hacks. There are heaps of free things on our website, but like we don't market it. Yeah. Why would we do that? Yeah. I'm silly. I'm not good at this. I offer my resources free to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander medical students. Oh, so you're like the most wholesome person in the entire world. Yeah. I mean, it's been difficult for me throughout med school. And so, you know, you just want to help people in your

community. That's right. That's what it's all about. Love. All right. Well, let's get into a money diary because I want to ask you more about the financial side of things really, really soon. But let's start the way we always start a money diary. If I asked you to grade your habits from an A through to an F, what do you think they would be? So this year, I would say probably like a B compared to like the rest of my life. So I feel like I've exponentially improved in the last year. That's so good. Oh my gosh. All right. Let's get into it. Money Diarist, I want to know, this is my favorite question. Can you tell me a little bit more about your money story? Yeah. So I am a Torres Strait Islander woman. I grew up in Darwin. Both my parents,

one of them finished high school. The other one didn't. I guess they were kind of told like they need to get a job as soon as possible to kind of, you know, make a family, things like that. And so my parents kind of didn't go to university a lot of people in my family didn't go to university I guess we were all kind of just told like just get a job in the government you'll be safe you'll have a solid income and everything will be you know everything will be great you'll be set up for the rest of your life however that kind of changed a little bit when I was quite young my dad got diagnosed with like a very severe psychological illness which put him out of the workforce so he could no longer work and was on a disability pension and my mum kind of was

like the main breadwinner she worked like two or three jobs which is insane yeah like I think about it now and I'm just like what on earth are you like what were you doing I'm not not to spoil the story but now that you're a mum do you now go mum what the hell yeah yeah like how did you balance this yeah and and you know the reality was was that she didn't you know like it was very difficult and so yeah like she kind of was doing so many things so it was kind of like this parallel where she was super super tight with money and my dad was kind of a little bit like I wasn't sure if he ever contributed to the bills or anything like that with his pension but he was the kind of one where like, if we wanted like a Macca's ice cream or something, like he would buy it for us, you

know, or, you know, if we wanted to go to the movies or something, you know, he would buy it for us. So I kind of grew up with those two parallels and I was, I guess, kind of encouraged to start work early. So I started working in a part-time job when I was 12 years old, which is like, you know, back then, I don't think there were any laws about how old you could be when you worked. So I was 12. You look very young. You're only 29. So no, there are definitely laws, but I'm going to make some grand assumptions here, my friend. You were paid in cash, weren't you? No, I wasn't. It was all, yeah, it was all on the books. I was paid super. At 12? Yeah. I'm impressed. Honestly, I'm very impressed.

Yeah. So I don't know if the, yeah. So anyway, that was, and I got like $6.50 an hour or something so I started working when I was 12 in like part-time jobs and I guess kind of growing up you know we didn't have a lot like my parents had to default on their home loan so we you know we're just moving rentals every year and so you know we got the bare minimum and you know we got food on the table and there wasn't really kind of anything that I didn't get yeah so there wasn't like this energy like the vibe that I you know was poor or anything like that but it was just kind of like oh we just don't spend the money on a lot of things right so when I started working I was like oh my god I'm so rich like I have all this money and the only thing I guess that was told to me

from my mom she had to be very strict with her money it was just like you just need to save your money like that was kind of the extent of my financial education yeah what do I do mom yeah just save it you'll be fine yeah and so what did I do I spent all of it yeah yeah you you come across as someone who I can relate to and my dad also told me to save all my money but I didn't listen no because I'm much smarter than an accountant when I was 14 years old and nine months yeah well like yeah like I kind of you know like there were these like cool like custom shoes that were at City Beach that were like super popular they were like 80 bucks which is just ridiculous for that time. Like when I was that age. A hundred percent. Yeah. Like my parents could

not afford that. And so I was just like, you know, earning maybe a hundred dollars a week or a fortnight or something. And then like straight away, I'd be like, I'm getting these new shoes. I'm getting this, I'm getting that. And, um, I didn't save any of it. And then. Absolutely not. And in context, like it makes no sense. Like looking back, you're like $80. Like that is so much money when you're earning $6.50 an hour. Like if you do some quick calcs that's 12 hours of work that you did yeah for a pair of shoes yeah but at the time they were real cool shoes weren't they yeah they were like even now at 29 years old I'm like would I pay $80 for shoes like maybe maybe not but that was just really interesting and then

I guess kind of you know I kind of went through a few different part-time jobs like various kind of retail outlets, which was great. And shortly afterwards at 16, my dad passed away. And so that was kind of like a very difficult time for a teenager and for, you know, my mom, who was like the sole supporter of our family. My dad, I guess, you know, he didn't really have any insurances or anything like that. So we kind of had to rely on family to try and support us financially for a little bit and to support like the funeral costs and all these things and I guess at the time I was just kind of like oh you know that sucks you know but now I'm like oh you know I wish she kind of knew a little bit more about that you know and then yeah I guess

around that time was the first time that I was broken up with. Oh so you were heartbroken as well. I was absolutely heartbroken by my boyfriend of like, I don't know, three months. Yeah. Because you're in love after three months. Yep. I distinctively remember to this day, just being so like heartbroken and like not knowing what to do with myself. So I just kind of went to my bank, you know, back then internet banking didn't exist. Yeah. Of course you have to go down to the bank. Yeah. I went to my bank and I took out like $200, which was like my entirety of my savings. and I just shopped until I dropped. Oh my god emotional spending. That's been my life until like two or three years ago. Oh we just kept that up did we? Yeah we did. Oh good yeah at least did

you enjoy it? Did you get some more good shoes? I mean at the time yeah it was great fun. We've just got to live and learn through these things honestly there's no point holding any shame about parts of our money story because what does that do for us? Literally nothing. Yeah exactly I feel like I went through like trial by fire though when it came to my finances yeah wow and then I kind of you know after losing my dad I transferred to a new school and I kind of I won a scholarship to go there it was one of the best private schools in Darwin and so I went there and you know I just decided that even though I was a good student that I was just not gonna you know be that involved in class and things like that. And I kind of like, you know, decided that, like by then I had my

car and my pee plates, you know, because in Darwin back then you could get it at like 16 years and six months, you could get your pee plates. Oh my gosh, really? I had to wait till 18 down in Victoria. They were very strict on this. I used to think it was a joke, but that is okay. Yeah, it's definitely, what I see now in the hospital, it's definitely appropriate. I was about to say it's a good idea. Yeah. So I kind of just rocked up to school whenever I felt like it. A lot of my friends had already dropped out to do kind of like apprenticeships or go work in government. And I was very close to doing that as well, but I can't remember why I just decided that I wasn't going to do it. And then, you know, one day I kind of just, you know, walked out of

class and I was like, I don't like this school. I don't like Darwin anymore. Like it was just getting a bit too much for me. And so I just decided I was going to go to boarding school. you were going to boarding school yeah yeah with whose money who was who was funding that one yeah exactly no one's no one no one could fund it for me so I kind of just I found some boarding schools down south that looked good I kind of just typed in like boarding schools South Australia and then the first one I just called up and I was like hey I'm like keen to come to your school like you know can I talk to your principal like are they free straight to the top babe I was 17 I just there was no fear I was just like can I just have chat and they allowed that and they were like oh yeah

he's he's free let's like let's just have a quick chat he's free yeah okay and then what happened you've got to tell the whole story here my friend yeah and then I kind of just like spoke to him I was like oh hey like I'm year 11 student in Darwin like I really want to attend your boarding school down south like I really at the time I wanted to be a lawyer I was doing legal studies I really enjoyed it and I was like you know I just don't think that if I stay here I'm gonna get the grades that I want to be able to like get into law and he was like okay and then it just so happened that like you know a lot of the boarding schools down south they go to kind of like rural remote areas to try and like get interest in boarding and things like that and so he was like oh we're

actually coming up to Darwin like next week like why don't we meet I was like sweet and then we kind of went through the interview you know he was like you know like why do you want to be a lawyer why do you want to come down south blah blah blah and you know I was just like a very good talker which is why I wanted to be a lawyer and he was like well we'd love to have you at our school and I was like so my mom is a single mom she can't afford it she's on like 50k a year yeah wow like she just can't afford your like 40k a year fees yeah that's not gonna happen yeah and he was like oh look like leave it with me and I'll like get back to you this was like a couple of months before the next school year started and then he kind of like called my mom up

the following week and he was like oh hey like I found like one of our previous students or like I'm an old scholar like has their own scholarship fund and they'd be really happy to like pay for for her to come down and study for year 12 what and like pay for boarding as well and then it all just happened. Yeah. So it was just amazing. Baby, you was like, what do you mean that private schools are restrictive? I'll be going to one. Actually, you know what? I'll just pick one, whichever one I want. We'll be going there. I actually picked this one because it was the first co-ed school on the list. Oh, well, yeah. There were boys there, obviously. You don't want to just go to an all girls school if you're planning your own life out, right? No. So I was

like you know I gotta keep my options open and she's a genius yeah the devil works hard but this money diarist she works harder guys yeah but I absolutely loved it like it was just I came down I was getting really good grades you know the teachers were super supportive I had a lot of tutoring support that the boarding house provided to me and it just was just such a change from being you know in a rural place and coming to a different kind of environment where you know I guess they were just so encouraging and like yeah you can do it and you know I just hadn't really experienced that before and so you know I really really enjoyed it and I can't speak like highly enough of that school like it was just amazing and so yeah after that I decided to stay you know

down south for uni because I wanted to go to uni I did start doing law like I managed to get like a cadetship so I was able to do like a couple of days in a law firm and the rest of the days at uni and so I guess throughout that time I started like coming into a lot of money like for at that time it was a lot of money for me so I guess I was getting maybe around $500 a week which was like quite a lot. That's a lot of money, especially with the background that you had come from and, you know, the income that you were historically earning just individually as a young teenager. Like that's, I feel like some people would look at that and go, oh, well, that's not that much money. That's so much money. I think for an 18 year old, which was like how I

was at the time and I also applied for a scholarship to get my accommodation like paid for so I was kind of living in an it was like a university college and so I had pretty much free accommodation but you know a lot of the students there you know they were just really focused on having fun and all of that stuff and I kind of had to work like two days a week in an office and like, I just wasn't really vibing the place. And so I decided to move out after my year had ended and my family moved down from Darwin. Oh, really? So I was living with them for a while, which was great. And then my sister went to the same boarding school. So, you know, she like was able to have that same experience, which was lovely. Oh, how beautiful is that?

Yeah. All because you decided to just call the first person that came up on Google. yeah literally how good is that and you've kind of like obviously you had worked out at that age you were 17 you're like look my trajectory isn't going to work out the way I want to I need this level of support you've not only changed the trajectory of your life but also your sister's life in making that decision isn't that wild yeah and she's doing very well now what does she do tell us so she's a final year neuroscience student what yeah but I'm trying to get her on the podcast because like me you know she's having a little bit of problems with money like in terms of budgeting and stuff so I'm helping her out a little bit as well so oh my gosh you're finishing

your doctor of medicine she's doing what like that is so crazy and my brother is also a lawyer what yeah I have a brother as well you have a brother who's a lawyer you have yeah two basically doctors in the family yeah what does your mum think of all of this is she the most proud woman in the entire world she is yeah oh my god I would be too like my heart is so happy hearing this story imagine how proud your dad would be of you I know oh my god he would be over the moon I bet he wouldn't even believe it yeah he would be yeah like I often have like a psychic that I talk to and she kind of connects with my dad and you know he does verbalize that like you know I'm so proud of you I can't believe that you're a doctor like all these things and that gave me goosebumps

I feel like it's so nice to know and I know that so many people are going to be skeptical of things like that. But it's just even if you don't believe in it, and I do, but even if you don't, isn't it beautiful that someone's found a way to deal with grief and loss and change and feel connected to a person in a way that without it you wouldn't be able to? Like it's just I don't care what people think because I definitely am of it. I actually spoke to, this is crazy, I spoke to a psychic. before I got pregnant both times. So I don't know how closely people follow me on social media, but recently I've gone through two pregnancy losses, both at relatively late stages, which has been awful. But the psychic that I spoke to predicted both of them perfectly. I mean, she didn't say that I'd lose them, but she predicted absolutely everything around it.

She predicted gender. She predicted how I'd feel. She gave me all of these things. And it's crazy because I've shown my team the like notes that she gave me and they were so specific they were like this song this sign and all of them are not common like it's not as though oh Victoria here's a top 10 song that's gonna be playing and you'll feel connected to it it was just like too many she told me the dates she told me everything isn't it crazy how the world and the universe works like it just it blows my mind yeah no it's I've definitely relied on it a lot actually ever since I was a teenager to really get me through periods of grief and as well I've had two miscarriages as well and I've used that kind of as before I was studying medicine and not that I

don't do it now because I still do I have like a three monthly like psychic appointment I love it yeah like it's quarterly and you know like it's it helps me feel a bit more kind of like at ease and spiritually connected and like that's very common in Torres Strait Islanders culture as well you know to feel very you know like spiritually connected and things like that and we rely on a lot of those kinds of things to kind of place ourselves in the world and that kind of thing so like I've definitely relied on that a lot and like I often have like my pre-pregnancy psychic appointment like all these things like same so yeah literally same I feel like it's so beautiful that it's part of your culture and it just kind of makes sense

that that's then what grounds you and that's then what makes you feel so connected to like your ancestors and your family. Like it just, it kind of makes sense and I love the fact that even though, you know, you moved down to South Australia and like you went so far, you're still kind of in a way connected to that level of spirituality because let's be honest, a lot of the time when you uproot yourself in such a way, you actually lose a lot of that connection to culture

which ultimately is probably one of the most important things to you absolutely and yeah it's super important um around like 22 so this is before I kind of you know I'd finished uni I dropped out of law because I didn't like it I was doing international studies in sociology which I really really enjoyed worked in government for a bit got a graduate position and like the pay was great the entitlements were great I just didn't feel that fulfilled like working nine to five at a desk the whole week so I kind of decided then like that I would attempt to get into medicine yeah no biggie no biggie just a really small thing that you could go and do yeah yeah I mean I was previously told by teachers that I would not be smart enough to like get into you know anything

I was told that I couldn't even get into journalism, which is something that I really enjoyed. So that kind of, you know, when I was a teenager and I was like, oh, OK, I guess I'm not doing that. Some teachers need to be sat down and spoken to because I had a very similar experience where I was told I wouldn't go anywhere. Yeah. Like I had interest in medicine, but I was just like, oh, there's no way I can do it because people told me I wasn't smart enough. But then I was like, oh, just have a crack. Like, there's no problem. I already have a safe job. Like there's already like some kind of, you know, trajectory that I can probably, you know, get a bit higher, whatever. So I kind of like studied for all of that, did very well, got in. And then I decided

that I was actually really worried that I would not have kids because I would be super focused on my career. And so for me coming from like a Torres Strait Islander background, like family is super important and it was something that I really valued but I knew just my personality like so far I had just gotten myself into just like every single kind of extracurricular thing you could think of and I was really worried that like if I just jumped straight into medicine that I would hit the ground and run and just not look back and then it would it would be a bit you know too late by the time I considered that so at the time my partner was like I said to him you know like I'd really like to have a baby before I start medicine just to like you know get the ball rolling

that kind of thing and you know he agreed at the time and so you know we got pregnant we bought a house back then I just thought I knew things about finance I 100% did not I just kind of went to a broker and they just said sign here here's your like your house like his parents guarantored the loan so like we really didn't need to work hard for anything like and you know that was very privileged position to be in like no one in my family owns a house so like that's kind of been told to us like oh you know if you own a house like you've made it in life and so I was like well I just like got one so what's what's the problem but like honestly I knew nothing like I just walked in blind did not do my research did not really care for like anything I just kind of

thought okay we've decided to have a family let's buy a house and so we did and then about like 35 weeks pregnant my partner or previous to that my partner had been in an accident when I was like two months pregnant he accidentally got really quite injured and was in hospital for like two or three months and because it didn't happen at work he didn't obviously have any insurances to cover anything so I ended up paying for everything like the mortgage all of our joint bills we had a car loan at the time and I was only on about $1,800 a fortnight from my government job and it was very much a tight squeeze it was very stressful and then he couldn't go back to work or like rather he didn't want to go back to work I think and so about like 36 weeks he just decided that

like he didn't want to be together anymore yeah wow he was just kind of like oh yeah I just like don't love you anymore so like let's just break up oh good idea babe I'm only 36 weeks pregnant with your baby and we have a mortgage and a car loan together and probably a lot of connection that that's okay. Have a nice life, sir. It was very, very just nonchalant. Like it was very shocking. And I felt, I guess after that, like I had to move back in with my mum, which I was really grateful that, you know, like I definitely do not have the bank of mum and dad, but if I ever need anywhere to stay, I can always stay with them. So that's always been great. And so I moved back in with her, gave birth. At the time I was able to get mat leave from my government job and

from Centrelink. So, you know, I did have quite a lot of income at that time, but I was still having to like pay for my half of the mortgage, even though I had moved out. And I kind of gave him a deadline. I was like, look, I'm going to give you like six months to like get back to work and decide what you want to do with the house like I can't continue paying this mortgage it was like $800 a month for me to pay I was like look I'll help pay for a little bit but like we need to sort it out like you know because I just thought legally I still was on the mortgage so I still should have paid it even though I wasn't living there yeah and so by the time I stopped paying it I was like hey he hadn't made a decision about what we were going to do and I just thought okay

well you can just pay it because you're living there and then I got a call from the bank to say that we had defaulted because he had not paid the mortgage for like two months in a row or something yeah so I was like my baby was like five months old and then here I was just being like oh my god my credit is just gonna go through the floor yeah like I was just so it was just such a stressful time thankfully like that's kind of what got his parents kind of made him sell the house so that we could get out of it yeah but that's kind of I guess what happened and yeah like he doesn't pay child support he's not really involved in our life which is fine like I'm happy to pay for my kid yeah but it would be nice to know that he wanted to support like

it's a crazy juxtaposition, right? Like some people really, really need the money, which makes sense. But knowing the rest of your money story, which our listeners don't right now, your life has turned around completely. Like you have a beautiful fiance, right? Like tell us about that side of it because right now it's looking a little bit grim. Yes. So at that point I started using Afterpay a lot. I relied on Afterpay for all of my purchases from when my son was like one years old. And then a couple of years later, I started medicine again. I was able to win a scholarship, which allowed me to move out of my mom's house. And I was able to rent, you know, just a small place for me and my son at the time, which was really amazing. And then shortly after

that, I met my fiance now. Exciting. How did you meet? So we met on Hinge. Stunning. Yes. So I kind of think it's a little bit of fate because he was only like here down south for like two months before he was moving overseas so this was like at the start of 2020 right so this is when everyone was like super happy and everyone was going really well and then we started dating you know we decided like our values align and you know we'd like to be serious and you know he knew that in the long term like he would be considered my son's dad but at the time he was training for a job that would be based overseas so because he was a pilot so he went overseas I think about a month after we started dating you know we had all these plans like yeah we'll go back and forth and all these

things and that's when I started to get a little bit better with my money because I was like okay I gotta save money so I can go overseas and see like my partner but then COVID hit oh no and so like he couldn't get back I couldn't get to him and then throughout that period of time throughout all of 2020 then my money habits like went pretty bad again like I pretty much spent the entirety of my money on either plants or uber eats that's relatable for COVID though yeah that's really relatable like an exorbitant amount of money like it was crazy like it was kind of like that whole like just emotional spending again like I really was just like you know I had my son at home with me for the he like he couldn't go to child care like I was trying to study medicine online which

was very difficult and like pass my exams and things like that and and so yeah it was just really difficult to deal with that like by myself yeah wow well obviously I had the support of my partner like he would you know emotionally there but not physically right yeah and so like you know he would like skype us every day and like built a really good relationship with my son which was amazing but then towards the end of that year he got told that he was being made redundant because of COVID because he was a recent hire so then he kind of came back to Australia and yeah since then he told me to tell you that like my money habits have gotten way better because of him oh okay yep yeah and I disagree you know what we can give it to him let him have it let him have it I mean we

had similar upbringings but he kind of went in a different direction like he went in the whole like he needed to hoard all of his money like he really needed to save all of it he wasn't allowed to buy anything and I was kind of like just spend it because emotionally that makes me it's like a little bit of an emotional crutch it's funny how trauma and just the way we go through different circumstances can send us one way or the other yeah it's crazy to think that for one person you come out of a level of trauma and you save every cent you've ever had and become the best with money you've ever been. Or you flip and you go, you know what I'm really good at? Afterpay. Brilliant at it. And it's just crazy to think that different people just respond to different

circumstances in ways like that. I love learning more about people's stories purely because they're always so different. Yes. Well, like we kind of had to come to a happy medium because, you know, we kind of like we're getting mad at each other a lot about money so we kind of came to a happy medium and then you know I was still studying I was in my second or third year at uni we decided to have another baby because my son was getting a bit older and we didn't know when he was going to go back overseas so we thought let's just have another baby so that was kind of the first time that I attempted to save money or apart from the flights thing to like go see him in 2020 but I attempted to save money because I was a student I wasn't eligible for maternity leave from

Centrelink so like I wanted to take the whole year off to be at home with my daughter and so I kind of said to him like like that's what's important to me that's what I need before I go back to medicine and like we're gonna have to like work out all of our expenses and bills and like save up so that can cover that for when I'm at home basically so we saved up I think maybe 30 or 40 grand because he was still working so it was just kind of like to cover our additional expenses while I was at home so that was last year and yeah that we just kind of decided like I started getting super on my mat leave because I'm a very busy person I just can't like sit down and take care of a baby that's like really difficult so I just kind of decided last year

like that I was going to organize all these things and get my finances in order and then I found like she's on the money welcome to the family thank you we've done nothing your partner did it all yep absolutely he's he's going to claim that and then I just like I just told him like hey we should probably get married. You just told him, I feel like you're a vibe. You just called a principal and said, hey, you should give me a full scholarship to your boarding school. That's what's going to happen. You just told him, you know what, we're going to have a baby. You're at home. Also, by the way, we're getting married. Did you know that? Did he take it well? He agreed? He did. Yeah. I mean, it was definitely something we had previously talked about. We just weren't

entirely sure when it was going to be right because you know we're just in different like our career paths were a little bit like you know like tumultuous we just didn't know when like the perfect time would be and so I kind of said to him last year like hey I figured out the perfect time for us to get married which is going to be at the end of this year so once I finish my med degree and before I start working as a doctor yep stunning she's planned it all out yep and then so that was like in the middle of mat leave and I just said like hey I'm just gonna start doing all of this stuff and I'm just gonna like book it in just get it done save all our money sort it all out yeah so that's kind of what happened and that was last year and the wedding

is pretty much all sorted I don't need to worry about that at the moment how exciting but it is an expensive wedding like it's gonna be you know it's in Darwin he is Chinese I'm Tresha Islander we have like a billion family members who 100% need to all be invited and you know that's really important to us as well we're very like family orientated what's expensive when it comes to a wedding well like I didn't think it was that expensive because I've just heard that this is the general price but whenever I say to people oh it's this much money they're like they're like really shocked like so ours I think is going to be in total like for everything mind you we have cut expenses here or there. I think it was going to be $57,000. Yeah, wow. It feels like a lot of

money, but at the same time, that's about the average of what an Australian wedding is now. And I mean, the average is probably not that reflective because that takes into consideration those outliers of people who do spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on their weddings. But at the same time, I don't think it's shocking when people spend that anymore. I think in, you know, maybe 1990, if you're saying that was what your wedding cost, people would be horrified. But these days, I think times have changed, right? Like marriage is no longer some kind of prerequisite to having a successful relationship. And, you know, as you've shown, you don't need to get married to then have kids and have, you know, a perfect timeline. You

can kind of just make it up and do whatever you want that makes you happy. And I think that nowadays because marriage I don't know I feel like from my perspective marriage now feels like a luxury like it is a luxury to me to have had the opportunity to get married to my partner because to achieve all the other life things that we wanted to do we didn't need to be married and technically I feel like I had very very similar rights before we got married but I think it's now exactly become a luxury so when you talk about the expense of it it feels like a bit of a cheeky expense. Whereas historically it was like, oh, money diarist, how very dare you move in with your not married man? Like it's crazy, right? To think how different the world used to be. And now

it's just, you do whatever you want. Like I lived with my partner for years before we got married. We had pets, like we didn't have kids yet, but it wouldn't have surprised me if we had had kids yet. Like it's just, it's the world we live in now where I think that people are shocked because it feels like a luxury expense, right? And I know a lot of people have said to me like, oh, wouldn't you like think that money could be better spent elsewhere? And I've kind of said like, well, why are you questioning my money values and the way that I'm running my life? Maybe for you, if you had that, but it's crazy because I had quite an extravagant wedding. My wedding was very over the top. I regret nothing. Not one thing. Not one thing. The amount of times people

were like, do you wish you spent less? No. Probably could have spent more. Best day of my entire life. Like I loved every second of it. My husband and I talk about it weekly still. We're always like, oh, our wedding, we could do it again. Like it was the best thing ever. But then there are people who say, oh, I'd never get married. It's a waste of money. You do you, boo. That's fine. I could not care what you spend your money on. But what I do ask is that you respect the decisions I make around my finances because they do not impact anybody but me. They don't. So I think it's wild to me that people can be so judgmental, like, oh, couldn't you spend that better? Yes, Suzanne, probably could. Not gonna though. Absolutely. I have lots of questions and I want to dive

straight back into your money story right after this. All right, guys, we are back. This Money diarist is incredible. I am so excited to be sharing her with you. I want to know now though, what are you currently doing for work and how much are you earning? So like I'm a final year medical student. I have like some scholarships that I've accumulated over the years from studying. So from those, I get about $1,700 a fortnight. I'm also a tutor for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander university students. So I tutor at about four different universities. Oh my gosh. Yeah. You're doing all of this stuff and someone at some point had the audacity to tell you, you weren't smart enough for medicine and now you're teaching it to other

people. Okay. Yeah. It's also kind of a little bit of a selfish thing, like in that I really enjoy, you know, like helping them and helping them understand things. And I didn't necessarily have that same tutoring support in my early years of medicine especially not from someone who was Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander so there was that kind of mutual understanding of lifestyle and culture and like our kind of expectations of our commitment to medicine like it's just a little bit harder like not all of us are living with our parents you know we have kids we just have a lot of things that we need to juggle it around especially if we need to go you know go away and see family and things like that and so you know I feel like you know like I kind of help

my students understand stuff so that they can just like shut off and just focus on their life as well like have a good work-life balance focus on family focus on their kids focus on you know if they need to work as well like it's really really difficult and when you're studying medicine like my uni particularly it's only four years so it's just like bam bam bam bam bam like it's just non-stop yeah that's really condensed like it's non-stop and so people you know have a really tough time like trying to work through that and like just having so many things that they need to do and also just emotional support as well yeah totally totally and I mean I can't empathize with it because I haven't been in that situation, but I can completely understand that that's actually

really necessary. Like you just want people that get where you've come from and get your, I guess, background and what you've been through. And it just makes sense that you would fall perfectly into that situation to be, I guess, that supportive person. I love that you get to do that. And I love that people get to experience you in that way. They get to actually, you know, connect. And I feel like that's so important, especially during uni when it can just feel all consuming and overwhelming, right? Yeah, absolutely. So for my tutoring, it's quite variable because it just depends on the student's requirements. But since I'm tutoring for four unis, I generally get about a thousand to two thousand a fortnight from tutoring. Wow. Yeah. So you're just doing really

well financially as well while studying at uni and you've started your Etsy side hustle. Yeah, that's right. Made a hundred bucks from that thus far. Passive income. We love to see it. Is there any other way that you're generating income? I also do and this is like very casual like I kind of do like writing reviews for a local kids social media presence like if we go to a new playground I'll write a review on that if we go to a new like recently we had the Adelaide Fringe so like a lot of the shows that are directed towards kids I can write reviews on that that's very casual I only do it when I have time and if you know my kids are interested in what we're going to do but generally like around 400 a year. I'll get from that as well. Oh, how cool is that? I feel like you're

the ultimate side hustler going to be a doctor. Yes. Yeah. How good. Yeah. All right. You mentioned before that you're getting married soon and that's all kind of like sorted, but I want to know what big money goals are you currently working towards? So that's one of them. Like I still have about 40K left. I need to save for that, which I think will be fine. Like over the next couple of months, just like that with my partner's income as well because he works FIFO so he kind of covers a lot of the things and I save for the wedding pretty much my entire income yeah wow yeah so we have that I recently just started my own Sharesies portfolio I guess like being a little bit I felt really comfortable after I had listened to a lot of things on She's On The Money and some other

kind of like finance podcasts I finally felt comfortable enough to just I guess start that Congrats. That's so exciting. Yeah. So I put $50 a fortnight into that and just kind of like alternate. I love shares. It's like I alternate automatic investment profiles or whatever they call it. One fortnight I invest into blue chip stuff and the following fortnight I invest into ETFs. And so I have around 600 in that at the moment, but I really like the automaticity of that. So that just kind of does its own thing for me. Yeah. I feel like that makes things so easy. That was actually my next question to you. I was going to say, do you invest? If so, what in? You've already answered that, but do you invest in any other ways or is it just

sharesies at this point? At the moment, I just have sharesies. I have been putting away money for my current kids slash future kids, which I probably, I've been looking into a few different ways where I can invest that. The Vanguard kids account also sounds pretty good. So as I kind of start working properly next year that'll be my focus to kind of really up my shares investments and really get all of that going yeah and also like next year probably we do want to buy a house so that'll be like another block of saving we'll have to do how good all right I want to know you mentioned that you used to be pretty good at after pay do you currently have any debt if so what is it and what is it for so I stopped using after pay it's been almost a year now good behavior

Yeah. Yeah. I used it for such a long time. It just becomes a habit. It just becomes a way that you function, right? It becomes part of your budgeting cashflow system and it can be really hard to move away from if you become dependent on it. And see, my partner doesn't use it ever because he always just, if he needs to buy something, he already has cash on hand or like that he's already saved for. So like he's never used it. And so, you know, as I started, you know, educating myself a little bit more about finance and listening to things. And then I looked at my credit score which is like average it's not great and so I was like oh like I really need to stop using this so I stopped using it about a year ago and it's been great I haven't

been tempted to use it again like I feel like there were a lot of times where I was like I paid it off and I was like I'm not going to use it again and then within like a month I would use it again but yeah like I haven't used it for a year I don't think I'll use it again now because I've actually been able to put myself in a position where if I need to buy something I have money sitting there. Like I don't need to put it over a month per se. I have a car loan. It's currently sitting at 17K, but I make regular payments on that and then it finishes up next year. So I'm keen to just pay that out and then just like leave it there and like not get another car loan. That's the only debt that I have at the moment. How good. All right. Yeah. It sounds like you've

got some pretty good money habits. What would you say is your best money habit? I think just at the moment like the fact that I'm saving quite a lot of money for the wedding and not digging into it is just next level for me because that's never been the case for me for such a long time for like my whole life basically yeah wow so the fact that I've you know been able to like get educated enough and like manage my self-control and just kind of you know not be needing to buy a lot of things. I think that's my best money habit at the moment is the fact that I'm literally not spending the money that I'm saving. See, that's a good money habit. It takes a lot of discipline and change for that to occur. Like, let's bring down the mood again, though. I want to know,

what do you think is your worst money habit? So I particularly don't think I have one, to be honest, because I'm just amazing now. But according to my partner, he reckons my worst money habit is that I use the heater too much at home. That's not a bad money habit. That's an essential service. I don't know why he's talking about it. Because I pay for it. I don't care who's paid for it. This was an ongoing argument growing up for me. My dad would always set the heater in our house to 21. He would go to work. I'd put it up to 24. He was on his way home from work. I'd put it back down to 21, pretend it never happened. That's literally me. It's genius. I still do that. I still do that. The best thing about being an adult is being able to regulate

your own heater in your own house. I know. I know. I'm not talking to your partner about that. He can have the credit for your financial literacy, but I'm not letting him tell you that using the heater too often is a bad idea. One out of 10, can't recommend. I also do tend to like whenever there's a scrub sale, so like hospital scrubs, I literally have like 10 different pairs of hospital scrubs that are all different beautiful colors and I love them I've just kind of like gone from not wearing professional clothes now in the hospital because it's just uncomfortable and I also just had a baby and none of them fit me and I don't want to buy new clothes and so to buy a pair of scrub sets on sale is like about 40 or 50 dollars and so I've just kind of like as I've had spare money

as I go along I've just kind of bought one here or there and now that's my uniform now you've got a gorgeous collection. I mean, but if I was left to my own devices, I would definitely order more. Yeah, that's fair. We'll try and manage that. Oh my gosh. This has been an epic money diary. The last question before we go though, is you mentioned at the start of this episode that you were a B when it came to grading your money habits. And I feel like I've learned so much about you, so much about what you've done for your family, but also just the fact that you've managed a baby having had a mortgage historically getting out of that now having another baby going through medicine getting rid of after pay like doing everything that you've done having the

side hustle that you have and then also doing tutoring and having your scholarship I feel like you are just way smarter at money than you probably give yourself credit for. Do you still think that you're a B and if so why but if not what would it take to get to an A? Look you've convinced me. So I feel like I can be an A. I know you can be an A. We can all be A's. It just takes a lot of work. It does. I feel like I'm on such a good trajectory now. Like I have a good income coming in. And next year as I start working as well as a doctor, like I'll continue to have a good income. And it's just going to go up from there. Yeah. Like I really want to focus on investing a lot. Like I don't necessarily want to retire early, but I want to have a good,

you know investment portfolio with a good like passive income so that you know I can kind of just start working part-time because you know spending time with my family is really important to me and I don't really buy into the whole like six days working a week as a doctor so yeah that's fair especially when you have kids and you did drop future children so I'm assuming that you're going to have more than two and I feel like yes you're going to need a lot more work-life balance. Yes. And that's huge for me. So yeah, I really want to set myself up so that that's possible and I don't need to be working for money, you know. I love this. I feel like this has been such a beautiful story to share with the community. Unfortunately, that is all

we have time for today. Money Darius, thank you so much. I'm so grateful that I get to share this story and that people get to learn from you. If not about becoming a doctor, but just about putting yourself out there and asking because what's the worst thing people can say? No, you just call another school and ask for a different scholarship. Thank you. Thanks for having me. 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.