She's On The Money - MONEY DIARIES: An Insight Into Island Life

Episode Date: April 28, 2024

Would you pay $10 for a packet of Doritos? How about $9 for a wilted bunch of Kale? Well this is daily life for today's Money Diarist who lives on one of Australia's remote islands. Her unique career in a male dominated industry gives her a lot to say about the inflated cost of living, and also some fascinating insights into a pretty unique way of life. She's worked her way up in her industry and negotiated $40,000 pay rise in 6 months! We can't wait for you to meet this absolute powerhouse. Friends! If you loved this episode, then we know you are going to love Victoria's new book, Money Diaries with She's on the Money! This book has been written so you can feel empowered and see that YOU have the power to rewrite your own money story! It's coming in May but you can pre-order your copy now, click here!  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, Kurni, Wolperi and Awadjuri 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 Awadjuri 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 absolute pleasure of sitting down with one of our She's on the Money community members to talk all about their journey. Let's jump straight into it because this week I got a message and it sounded like this. Hi V, I have a pretty unique career in a male-dominated industry and live an island life in a very remote part of Australia. I have a lot to say about the inflated cost of living due to my location, but I've worked my way up and negotiated a $40,000 pay rise in the last six

months. I'd love to share my less than average lifestyle with the community. Same, welcome to the show. Haha, thank you so much for having me. Wow, you make my life sound pretty interesting. You wrote that. Oh no, Annalisa, our producer wrote that. So I told you she was a good egg. Before we were recording, I was talking about how great she is, but that is it though. Like, where is the lie, my friend? Yeah, it's true. That is my life at the moment. I'm so excited to learn more about it. Before we get there, could you give us a little bit of an idea? What grade would you give your money habits from A through to F if I asked you to grade them? Yeah, so I was thinking a B plus, I think, would sum up your money habits at the moment.

Well, let's learn more about it. You said you have an island life in a very remote part of Australia. And I want to know more about your money story. So tell me where you come from and now why you're on an island. Yeah. So I live in a really remote island in the north of Australia, which is about as north as you can get, actually. It is a beautiful lifestyle. You know, it's a very slow lifestyle. And I've managed to fall into a career up here that I never thought I'd fall into, but it's going very well and I'm really enjoying it. I'm feeling very blessed to have this job. So yeah, island life is absolutely incredible, but it doesn't come without its difficulties. You know, cost of living up here is definitely felt a little bit more

just because we're so remote and things are shipped in from very far away. How did you grow up around money? I was raised in a single parent family. So there was definitely never a lot of money while I was growing up but in saying that my mum is incredible she's always managed to provide everything that myself and my brother needed so I definitely learned a lot of my money habits from her she was a great saver and instilled those beliefs around money and me and my brother so after school I went to university and I lived the university life which is never a very wealthy life I was living at home in Melbourne and working to support myself through that and after graduating

uni, I kind of thought, well, an office job isn't for me. So I fled Melbourne and I came to Queensland and I've been working on boats ever since. On boats. That's interesting. I love this. So tell me a bit more about the decision to go, you know, I don't want to leave an office job. I want something else to going, you know, what is for me a boat? Like how did you go from, you know, making that decision from being in uni, which is relatively structured, let's be honest, to having obviously a much quieter life, but also working in that space? Yeah, so I was actually working hospitality when I was in university. And when it came towards my graduation, I was like, you know, I didn't see myself going straight into an office role. So I

thought, well, I'm going to go work in a hospitality venue somewhere a bit more tropical. So I actually applied for a job on Hamilton Island, and I was unsuccessful getting that job. and I was like well actually maybe hospitality isn't for me so I started applying for some sailboat jobs in the Whitsundays. They hired me so I started off as a hostess on one of the tourism boats up there. Oh very cool. Yeah that was about five years ago now and so it's just progressed from that. So tell me a bit more I need to know what do you do for work? How much money do you actually earn? So I work in marine pilotage. Oh yeah. Bit of an unusual job. I at the moment am earning just over 100k a year. We drive boats and we go out to the middle of a

shipping channel where we run into the side of a big ship that's still moving. We run into the side of a big ship moving. Yeah, exactly. We kind of just smash into the side. If there's a bit of a bang, it's all right. And then we put a very experienced mariner onto that ship so he can navigate it through the reef. I've heard of this. They're good pilots, but they've never been through that territory and you need someone who's like really familiar with it to like just get on for a short period of time, navigate through that and then they get off, right? Yeah, yeah. That is cool. So how did you fall into that? I mean, it's a bit of a jump to go from a hostess on a boat to being in marine pilotage. Like what's the segue there, my friend? Yeah, it was quite random how it

happened. I moved to the island where I'm living now and I met up with a friend that I'd known previously from the marine industry and she was working for this company already. And so she got me a job and I started out as a casual deckhand. That was almost two years ago now. And now I'm the assistant manager two years later. No, you're not. I am. That is so cool. Congrats. Tell me a bit more about island life though. I want to segue back to this because living remote, full stop is expensive, but then I feel like it might be super expensive living remote, but then also on an island. So can you tell me a bit about, I guess, your living situation? How do you rent and pay for housing or do you pay for housing? And, you know, what's food like? Because I'm assuming you

can't get Uber Eats. There's definitely no Uber Eats, so that does help with my saving. Yeah, so living on an island, it is very expensive. I do want to say that, you know, in my situation with my work, I am very privileged because I do have some things provided with my job. food is probably the biggest expense that I see to be fair I'm probably a little bit of out of touch with mainland prices I mean I understand that prices have gone up all over Australia but yeah you know living up here for instance we're paying $2.85 for a litre of fuel I went to the supermarket the other day and I paid $3.50 for a tin of chopped tomatoes no you didn't it's quite ridiculous that's like 99 cents at Coles for me sorry it's ridiculous

but everything that comes to the island is bought up on a barge so that just adds a huge freight cost to all the products that are bought to the island yeah it would and also sometimes those products are just not available quality especially fruit and vegetables can be quite low sometimes I think I paid ten dollars the other day for a very average bunch of silverbeet of silverbeet yeah that's not even like an expensive exciting vegetable that's silverbeet I know but you still have to get your greens. Oh, I'm not disagreeing. I actually really love a bit of silverbeet. I grew up on a farm and I feel like that stuff grows like weeds there, but paying 10 bucks for it would give me the ick. Yeah. Probably my largest expense is my grocery bill at the moment. Like I

said, I am very lucky in my job that things are provided for me. For instance, I have a work car, so I don't have to pay for my own car or fuel. Oh, very nice. And I understand that everybody on the island is not privileged to that like we are. Yeah. My rent is also subsidized by work so I think work subsidizes it by about $300 a week and I still end up paying $170 a week. Okay that's pretty good because that would be expensive rent otherwise. Yeah it's really lucky to live on the island without rent supplied by your work it would be almost impossible just because there is no accommodation available. Yeah wow. Work also covers most of my bills so they pay for my gas and my water and my internet. And the only bill I have to pay for myself is my electricity.

This is becoming very appealing. Like I wasn't so sold on remote work, but now you're like all of this stuff is covered. Also, I'm earning just over $100,000 per year. Does that put you in a very attractive savings position? It does. I had never earned money like this before falling into this role. So I have hit some pretty incredible saving goals this year. Well, let's talk about them. What are your big money goals? My biggest money goal this year is to buy property. So I'm just going through the process at the moment of pre-approval. Oh, yeah. So looking to purchase an investment property, hopefully in the next month or two.

Oh, that's so exciting. That's so soon. And so have you got your deposit together and all of the balls are in the right places? Yes, I have my deposit ready. I have gone through this process once before, but also living on the island, it makes it very difficult to view properties. Of course. It has slowed me down a little bit in my search for properties, but I think I've reached the point where I may just have to purchase without viewing the property first. Yeah, right. Are you purchasing remotely or are you purchasing back like where your mum is or like what's the plan with location for this property purchase? At the moment, I'm looking at Cairns in far north Queensland. And is that because you want to live there at some point

or is this a good investment opportunity or what does that look like? For me, I think it is a place where you can buy a good investment opportunity. Also, if things were to fall through with renting it out and I did have to move there, I would have access to employment. Yeah. And I have lived there previously. So it's a place that's just familiar to me. Yeah, great. Cairns is gorgeous as well. so like I would not be mad if I had to go and live there like oh no I have to live in far north Queensland how bad is that I know it's tropical paradise there minus the crocodiles it is so beautiful all right so property purchase what are your other big money goals I don't have too many what I would call short-term money goals at the moment I think once I tick off

buying a property then I'll start to look but yeah for long term you know I'm not a person who particularly wants to work a full-time job for the next 30 years, 40 years. So I would really like to find myself in a position down the track where I can work less, you know, if that looks like paying off property so that I don't owe anything on it as quick as possible. You know, those are probably my goals down the track. I love that. What does not working full-time look like to you? Is it just vibing out during the day? Like how many days a week are we talking that you would actually work like give me an idea of what this goal lifestyle looks like so I think my perfect roster would be four days a week or three days a week you know I have a lot of

things that I would like to do on the side and maybe that could also include my own business as well fun yeah I don't know what my own business would be but I would really like to be able to support myself and work for myself. I think that's probably my ultimate goal. I love it. It is a lot of stress, but it is definitely worth it. All right. Let's go to a really quick break because on the flip side, I want to ask you, I guess, about investments, about debt and your best and worst money habits. So guys, don't go anywhere. All right, Money Diarist, we are back and you are living an island life in a very remote part of Australia, which now you're telling me about it, I'm kind of envious of. Like I just look at it and go, oh my gosh, what on earth?

This is so far from what my reality is. What do your days off look like if you're stuck on a very remote island? What do you get up to? Well, the only thing you can do on an island is go on a boat. That's okay. You like boats, I've heard. I do like boats. Even on my days off, I drive them. So we will go around the islands, go wakeboarding, just lay on the beach, go for a bit of a snorkel, trying it away from the crocodiles is my ultimate goal ah yeah no thank you but to be fair I actually don't have a whole lot of spare time because I do work two jobs two jobs yes I do work a second job so I often use my days off and also my annual leave to fit my second job in tell me more what is this second job you didn't mention that when I said what do you do for work and how much money

do you earn I work for a not-for-profit in the environmental sector oh my gosh how did you forget that? It is just a casual job and the hours are very varying. Some weeks I may not work at all and then others I'll do 30 hours a week. So that job looks like a lot of computer time as well. But I also do get to go out into the field quite often and work with traditional owners and rangers on country. Oh my gosh, gorgeous. Yeah. So I work on different islands and back on the mainland doing that as well. So what kind of income are you earning from that in addition to your 100 grand in your job in marine pilotage? So that is a casual job. So I'm paid on an hourly basis. As I mentioned, it's very sporadic, the hours. Last tax year, I think I earned an

extra 12 grand with that. And I'm probably earn about the same this year. Yeah, that honestly is so cool. And the fact that you get to, I guess, connect so much with the land, I'm assuming you're learning a lot as you, you know, do the work that you do. I feel like that's a dream. That is very, very cool. So tell me now about investment. Do you have any investments? If so, what are they? If you don't, do you have a plan? So I've been doing a little bit of listening to She's On The Money. Oh my gosh, great idea. Can't recommend it more highly. I also have a raise account, which I've had for about three years. And with downloading and joining up with Sharesies, I now have started a plan to let my raise get up to $500. And once it reaches $500,

I'm withdrawing that and putting into my Sharesies account. Oh, I love this idea. And I don't mean to and tell you how to suck eggs. That's not what I'm doing. But did you know that Sharesies has just introduced roundups? So you could like do that inside Sharesies and not change from one investment platform, sell down an asset that might decrease in value and then transfer it to another one. I did not know that. And this is why I listen. Well, there you go. Hot tips. Love the strategy. Obviously, if we're exposing our money to the share market for a short period of time, there could be some volatility. And so that might be another way to protect yourself. But I'll let you look into that and make your own decision. It's just a little idea, my friend. That's perfect

to take out the middleman. Yeah. I mean, it's a genius idea, though. Like, have you found that having roundups has meant that there's just like money there that you're like, wow, I really didn't feel like that came out or wow, that hit $500 way quicker than I thought it might. Yeah. I don't notice the money going out of my account at all. I've had it for so long that it's just been a part of my account and budgeting all the time. I really enjoy the roundup. I do too. It's what I do because I like to think of myself as a relatively lazy investor. Like I've just like direct debited everything else. So that happens. And then I've got my roundups and sometimes I log in. I'm like, oh, look at me. That's so nice. Like I did all this work, but I didn't. That's my favorite.

I want to know next, do you have any debts? If so, what are they? If not, can I know a little bit more pervy detail about the debt that you might take on for this property purchase you're about to make? Sure. Well, the only debt I have is my HECS debt. I am feeling quite disheartened at the moment about how large my HECS debt is. It's up to about $55,000. Yeah, fair. I would feel stressed, but at the same time, it makes sense. I think going through university and even high school, HECS debt was always kind of sold to me as an interest-free loan, which in the last year particularly, it is certainly not. I think my HECS debt was raised by about $4,000 last financial year. That is my only debt. I do also have a credit card, but I pretty much just use

it for points on larger purchases and then pay it off immediately. With the property that I'm looking to buy, Cairns is still quite reasonably priced. So I'm looking at apartments in about $200,000 range. Yeah, cool. Of which I have quite a large deposit to put towards, whether I use all of my money as a deposit or not. That has a rental return on it of about between $300 and $350 a week. That's pretty good. And when you look at that and go, all right, well, you know, it's a $200,000 apartment. I can, you know, get good rental yield. Would you look at putting less of a deposit down and potentially putting money into like an offset account? Is that something that you've spoken to your broker about, I guess, structuring to make sure it works

really well for you? Yeah, that is something that I have spoken to my broker about and I will be putting it in an offset account. Love, we're all on the same page. I love that. Tell me now, what do you think your best money habit is? I think I'm a really good saver. I know you're a really good saver. Yeah, which I will also discuss in my worst money habits. But yeah, I think I'm a really good saver. I was thinking about this. I also purchase a lot of my clothes, furniture, you know, most things secondhand. My main priority behind doing that is probably because it's the most sustainable option, but it's also led me to like be able to save a lot more money by doing that. How does that work if you're remote? Like, is it still easy to, I guess, get access to that

market, you could say? Like, I feel like you would have less options. Yeah. So living up here, everything in my house is actually provided by work so I don't need to go out and buy furniture plates that kind of stuff when it comes to clothes I'm a big sucker for Depop oh I love Depop same I love to be able to support people as well and selling the clothes that they no longer use rather than bigger companies it's genius I love it I feel like I check Depop before I make any purchase nowadays as well because I'm like oh that's cute someone might have put it on Depop and half the time they have. Exactly. Yeah. And that's quite easy to get things sent up in the mail. It does take about three weeks to arrive. There's no instant gratification. Oh, I would suck up there.

I would forget that I'd ordered things and then they'd turn up and it'd be like, oh yeah. Yeah, I do end up at the post office quite a lot off here. And segueing from that, what do you think your worst money habit is? So yeah, as I mentioned, I think I'm quite a good saver. I think my attitude towards money has shifted quite a lot lately. So I think my worst money habits are based on decisions that I had made previously. I'm feeling quite annoyed that I haven't prioritized investment earlier on in my life, whether that investment looked like contributing extra to my super or buying a property sooner, or also making voluntary payments on my HECS. I feel annoyed because I did have the ability to do that sooner and I haven't.

But you didn't have the tools and resources and knowledge that you did now. You can't be too harsh on yourself. I feel like so many times we look back and go, oh my God, I would be so good if I X, Y, Z. Well, you know what? I'd be so good if I started investing the day I was born, but I didn't, did I? You're right. It is a terrible game to play the hindsight game. I think also one of my worst money habits is I have always been a good saver as I mentioned but typically before I moved up here that savings was always put towards travel yeah so I would you know get enough in my bank account to go traveling go traveling deplete it and then come back and start from scratch yeah okay and so that is what I'm trying to resist the urge to do these days I'm a little

bit more grown up now so if I can just resist that urge to not quit my job and go on a trip around the world, that would be great. I mean, it sounds pretty cool. Like, I think you could convince me. I think we could all do those things. But if that's your worst money habit, like you're a very interesting person. Like that is very, very cool. We've talked a lot. I feel like you are absolutely killing it and also living your best life at the same time. Like marine pilotage sounds slay. Like that sounds so cool. But then also getting to work in an NFP in the environmental sector like that would nourish you like I am assuming you're not doing it for the money because you obviously earn a lot in your bigger role but

it just sounds like that is so cool and you you live on an island and yes groceries are expensive but everything else kind of is subsidized so maybe it works out a bit but now that we've talked what do you think it would take to get you from a B plus to an A or an A plus? Yeah definitely just need to prioritize the investing. So if I can achieve my money goal of buying a property this year and once that's accomplished, move on to the next thing, whether that's property or a different investment, that's definitely what I would need to take me to an A. That is so cool. I love that because we know it's going to happen. Like you are getting into property and you will be able to leverage that one into the next one. Even just knowing that you've got a bigger deposit than you

need for your first property is going to be so constructive. Like I am obsessed and I can't wait to see where you go. Money Diarist, unfortunately, that is all we have time for today. But I have loved getting to know you, getting to know a bit about your story. It makes me want to go live on an island. I'm not sure my husband or my impending baby is going to like that idea, but like I'll pitch it to them and see what they say. But thank you so much. I think our community is going to love this story because it's just so different and so pervy so thank you yeah no worries thank you so much for having me of course 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 MoneySherpa PTY LTD ABN 321 649 27708 AFSL 451 289. Thank you.