She's On The Money - MONEY DIARIES: Creating Positive Money Habits One Day at a Time!

Episode Date: July 28, 2024

Growing up comfortable with money, today's diarist developed negative money habits becoming an impulsive and emotional shopper. But now pregnant, she's working on these habits, building her money goals and paying off debt! She and her partner are working on their budget with to be aware and be on the same page in time for bubs arrival. An important episode for those in this situation, those planning on expanding their family or just want to create positive money habits with themselves and partner! 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 we get to talk with one of our incredible She's On The Money community members all about their journey. Let's jump straight into it because this week we got a message and it sounded exactly like this. Hi, She's On The Money. I'm a money failure, but I'm working on it. I grew up in a wealthy family, but subsequently I learned no money skills. But now I'm getting out of debt slowly, working on a budget and moving from working less than seven hours a week to 30 hours. I've got a baby on the way. So now it's more important than ever for me to change my ways. I'm so excited

about this money, Doris. One, welcome to the show. Thank you. And two, I'm obsessed with the idea that you're giving us a money story, but like, you're not there yet. We're on the journey. Like we're changing our mindset, but we're in the middle of the mindset shift. Like, I'm just so excited to have a chat with you. I'm so excited. I love every money story and binge them. So I do love hearing all the inspo. Is it weird hearing me do the intro if you binge our money diaries and it's like for you and live? I was like, oh, this is me that we're talking about. This is very weird. How good. All right. Well, let's do a money diary. I always ask the same first question at the start. Money diarist, what would you grade your money habits if I forced

you to give them a grade from A through to F? I used to think it was an F. I'd like to be a bit kinder to myself and say I was an E because we're working on it. But yes. All right. Well, let's get a little bit further into it. We got a very brief summary of where you've come from, but let's dive deeper. Money Diaries, can you tell me a little bit more about your money story? Yeah. So I grew up with wealthy parents. They both grew up with no money. My mum lived in a small town with everybody in the one room in Italy and dad was pretty much the same, over in Melbourne. So they built what I would say is an empire. They provided everything for us. We all went to private school. So I'm one of six kids. Oh my gosh. You know someone's wealthy when

in 2024 people say I'm one of six. Like, okay. They provided everything for us. We went on an international holiday every year. Oh my God. With six kids, not even talking about money, like the logistics so the youngest three always went and then others added on depending on where they were with work so there's a lot of us to try and coordinate things with but yeah so everything was easily given to us not in the sense that like anything we asked for was given to us but we were very rarely told no if we needed something yeah you didn't go without yeah it was very good but we actually never spoke about money at all I've grown up with the same sort of sense that you know, I can go and travel every year and I can do this and do that. And I have been working

since I was 16. I really enjoy working. Some people would say I'm obsessed with working, I'm a workaholic. Because since I was about 18, I had studied full time and worked full time, if not seven days a week. So I do really like work as well. But as soon as I get money, I spend it. And I have a little bit of impulse control that I'm working on. but I would save money and then I would go on a holiday and I'd spend every single bit that I had and then repeat the cycle again so last year my appendix burst and I couldn't the job that I was in at that time they'd lost a lot of clients so I couldn't actually work many hours at all like I was in a beauty role and they'd only probably get about seven

hours of work a week and I had to then kind of adjust to the fact that I wasn't earning money and that I had my appendix. So the one time that I was going to be able to earn a bit more money if my job was picking up, my appendix was out to burst. And what I was studying last year, it requires me to fly interstate to do my prac. Oh, how annoying. And you're injured, so you weren't able to do a lot of that.

Yeah, so it made it a bit harder and it's definitely the most expensive degree I've ever done, having to fly interstate every semester. That's crazy. Yeah, but it's something that I love doing. Tell me about this degree though, like what degree has you travelling interstate and can I guess first, is it like something to do with marine biology or something that you need to travel to Tasmania for? No, that's pretty cool though. I would love to do that because I also love studying as much as I love working. I love studying as well, but I study clinical aesthetics

and it's actually not something I offer in WA. So there's only two universities in the country that offer it and they're both based either in Sydney or in Melbourne. So they help their practice interstate what do you do as a job when you study clinical aesthetics you are kind of less than an aesthetic nurse but more than a dermal therapist so you can do treatments you can do research you can do so much with it so it really depends on where you want to land I like being face-to-face with people so I'm doing treatments but it is one of those things that who knows where it takes me now that I'm pregnant that's literally so exciting I'm so interested in that space So it's like not a beauty therapist but it's also like not at the other end

where you're able to do like injections and like filler and Botox and stuff but you're allowed to do the middle stuff that a beauty therapist wouldn't be licensed to do. Exactly, and where I want to specialise, which I've still got about a year to go, is wound healing, so working with plastic surgeons and working with people who have got big wounds. Oh, how fun. And you mentioned in your story and also right now

that you're going to have a baby. tell me about that my partner and I've been together about a year and a half and we'd started talking about potentially having a baby at the beginning of next year and then she surprised us oh we loved this she's like guys it's my time to shine so I'm due at the end of this year I'm due in December but yes it was a lovely surprise we are not taking any part of this for granted so we thought we would be in a better position but that's fine we will take what we can get when it comes to babies. How beautiful. That's so exciting. I know this isn't money diaries questions, but how did you find out you were pregnant if it was a surprise? Because I think everybody knows that I

was trying to get pregnant. So I was like testing before I wasn't even meant to be testing. Everyone's like, you need to wait longer than a week. And I'd be like, I'm going to just test in case. Logically, we know that the line isn't going to come up, but how did you find out you were pregnant if it wasn't something that you'd planned? Yeah. So I was probably four or five days away from getting my period and I had a dream that I was pregnant. I'm so glad I asked. So I thought, I'll just pee on a stick. What's the worst that's going to happen? It's just going to give me peace of mind in case I'm a little bit wrong and that is what it is. But I was right. My dreams told me that I was pregnant. That's so sweet. Did you know you were pregnant with a girl?

Up until week eight, I actually thought I was having a boy. So the entire time I thought I was having a boy. And then we did our little niche test and no, she's a girl. It's wild. When I had Harvey, we didn't find out the gender until birth. And we were in the theater and the obstetrician held Harvey up and said, what have you guys had? And my husband was like, it's a boy. And I was just shocked because I thought he was joking because I thought I had the best mother's intuition in the entire world. Like I had convinced myself I was having a girl. I didn't care about the gender, but I just thought I was like, you know, full of intuition. Turns out I was incredibly wrong. He was most definitely a boy. And yeah, so that's just a humbling

experience for me. But ah, how exciting, a little lady. Yeah, I'm very, very excited. My sister gave birth to a boy earlier this year and my sister-in-law was about four weeks before me. So she's also having a boy so we're going to have three grand babies in a year which is exciting tell your parents they're welcome yeah well they can't stop crying if anyone else gets pregnant I think they might just pass out let's give them a little bit of a break money nurse I want to know now what are you currently doing for work and how much money do you earn so I work in retail I have two jobs so I'm working six days a week at the moment and I work in a casual role for both of them and one is the big beauty retailer we all know and love and one is like I sell jewelry

engagement rings and things like that yeah cool I feel like that's a nice mix with Mecca I can absolutely spend all of my pay in the blink of an eye but with the other one I'm not buying myself an engagement ring so and also I feel like if I worked at Mecca I would be on a slippery slope like you of all people are gonna know guys I'm a level four so like that tells you that if I worked at Mecca I'd have literally no money because I'd walk into work spend all my money and then leave yeah it happens everybody goes through it you get through to a point like I've been there for over five years so it's been a bit of time but you still spend your money every time. I don't think anyone walks into my friend doesn't buy something. Oh my gosh. And was it

always like a dream to work at Mecca? Because I feel like if you're in this industry, like you're someone who's studying clinical aesthetics and like putting your all into it, like I can't think of a better job to work out while you're studying. Yeah, it is fantastic because a lot of my degrees like skin conditions and skin health. So I get a lot of practice, I guess, without actually being able to diagnose. And they would absolutely love you because then you're giving good product recommendations. How good. Yeah, it's very curvy. I love doing it. Now, don't tell me what you earn per hour, but between the two of your jobs, how much money are you bringing home? It's roughly $2,200 a fortnight. The last financial year, because I didn't get to work for about six

months, it was actually only about just over $42,000. It's a bit hit and miss because like I said, both of them are casual, so it really does depend on hours and time of the year and all of that yeah but like those are good jobs to have while you're studying next question I want to know you've got a baby on the way you're slowly getting out of debt you're working on a budget but what are your big money goals at the moment first big money goal would be having an emergency fund not working much last year I don't have any savings left and then I would also be saving for some extra time off mat leave because I'll be using my Centrelink pay but if I want to have a bit more time with the baby. I don't want my partner to be, I mean, he's happy to be financially

responsible for all of us, but I would like to still contribute in some way. So I'd like to have a little bit of savings behind me as well. I love that. I feel like having an emergency fund at the moment is a really good goal. Have you sat down and thought about what an emergency fund for a young couple expecting their first baby is going to look like? Like what's the goal? I haven't thought that much about it, if I'm being completely honest. girl we need to sit down I know it's one of those things that like I'm really getting into it in the last month and we've never been people to like combine our finances we didn't even really talk about money until I started stressing about like what next year will look like oh my gosh it is so

stressful too and like when you start googling how much baby stuff is it's wild just to put your heart at ease and your mind at ease right now, they use next to none of it. You need onesies, the best ones are at Target, the Target brand ones too, $9.95, money win, burp cloths and a boob. You are fine if they don't want to take the boob formula, really simple formula. That's the plan. I'm hoping all of that, we're just going to buy as we need. So we've obviously got like the things we know we need, car seat, pram, all of that, but everything else, if she needs it we're five minutes away from baby bunting yeah see that's the mindset that I wish I had I kept worrying that I didn't have something and I'd be like oh my gosh like what if I don't have

it oh maybe I'll just buy it in case forgetting completely that I literally live 10 minutes from the memo and like everybody knows the memo has absolutely everything I should have used my brain a bit more but at the same time like it's really exciting I don't know you see something cute and I need this. I think the thing that saved me money diarist was that I didn't know what gender I was having. And that actually saved me a lot of money because I couldn't be impulsive on, oh, it's a little cute pink onesie or it's a blue onesie. Like I didn't buy a lot of gendered stuff. I kind of made sure I had the basics for like the hospital and like the few weeks after. Then I went ham online shopping while I was recovering in hospital. I was high on endone because at the end

of the day, I had had a cesarean and my baby was quiet at some point. And I was like, cool, if we are up at 3am feeding, I'm also shopping. I understand completely. Me and my partner have been very, you know, slow with buying her gifts just yet. But every now and then there's a very key thing. And I'm like, oh, I can't help myself. We need to have it. No, I adore it. All right. Let's stop the baby chat. I have a lot of questions. Let's go to a quick break. And on the flip side, I want to know more about this debt. I want to know more about how you're working on a budget. I want to know your best and worst money habits. So guys, don't go anywhere. Money Diarist, we are back and I am loving having this chat with you. I feel like we've

very quickly become besties. You've said that you're a money failure and you're working on it. You're currently studying clinical aesthetics. Last year, you made $42,000 and in December, you're having a baby. I just think there's a lot to unpack here, but I want to know first, money diarist, do you invest? If so, in what? If not, have you ever thought about it? Yeah, I have my super because I've been working for so long. I think my super is currently sitting at about $40,000. Oh, okay. It's a nice little nest egg that's building for me, which is lovely. and then I do also own some shares. I did it all myself when we were like right in the middle of COVID

and we were getting JobKeeper and I thought this is more than my casual wage. I'll just put it all towards shares. Oh, how good. I think I invested $500 in different actual companies because I was trying to find things that aligned with what I wanted to invest in. they've all grown to be sort of 175% of what I invest in. So they're returning well.

I thought you were about to tell me it was like $175,000 and I was about to be like, babe, this money diary is going in a very different direction that I had anticipated. Unrelatable content, but okay. Tell me how much have you got in shares now? So I originally invested $1,000. It's sitting close to $1,800. Oh, very nice over that period of time. I think I bought them in 2021. I also have Sharesies.

I've only been using it for probably two months now, but I've essentially just put $10 a week. Oh, she's a convert. I love it. I just want to make sure that there's something else going towards something. And if it doesn't work, it doesn't work for me. but at least I'm trying to get into the habit of putting away that $10 a week. So tell me a little bit more because diving into the share market for a lot of people can be

overwhelming and honestly uninspiring. I've been trying really hard for my entire career to make investing sexy. But when you start getting into the nitty gritty of it and you have to look at a fact sheet for an ETF or you look up a direct share ticker code on the ASX to read the website to make sure it's aligned to your values. Like the sexiness starts to wear off. Tell me a little bit about how you picked those initial investments and what platform did you pick? Like, how did you go, V, I'm an investor because you're young. Like this is something that so many of us just keep putting off and putting off. I used self-wealth. So I got into investing purely because my little sister has always been fantastic with money and we are competitive so oh I love a competitive

streak for getting ahead she's got into investing so I got into investing we have different values and what we want to invest in so I just did a bit of research and I found one that I was happy to invest in so I invest in like education focused shares and things like that oh how cool so yeah I just found a couple of shares I read as much information as I could and then I got too scared and I thought you know what I'm just going to trust my gut and pick a couple and go from there once you trusted your gut were you like oh this is definitely not as scary as I thought it would be because I feel like you get analysis paralysis just picking and then once you've picked you're like oh that's it that's easy yeah I just thought you know what what's the worst that's going to

happen. It's not the end of the world. I'll just pick, I'll see how it goes. And they all lost money for a long time. And here we are, we're back right up. It's better than we started. I love this for us. All right. Now, earlier you mentioned that you have debt and you're slowly getting out of it. Can you tell me a little bit more about this debt? What's it for? How much is it? What's the plan? Yeah. So when I was younger, I got a car loan, which the only way I was going to get a new car and a bigger car and a safer car was me getting a car loan at that point. And so I got my car loan and probably from the first payment onwards, I regretted it. No, how frustrating. It's the debt and the sting every month that it's coming

out that you're like, look, it was really sexy when I signed up for this. I don't really like having to give the money back every single month. That's no fun. That's exactly right. So rather than my minimum, I almost tripled what I was supposed to pay and paid it off a lot faster than I could while I was earning money. And then I think I've still got maybe $500. It's not a lot left on it. I'm about one payment away from finishing that, which is good. That's so exciting. How much was the car loan in its entirety? I was approved for $21, but then I got my mum to come and negotiate. Thanks, mum.

When I was buying the car. And it went all the way down to $17 because I had so much I wanted to put into it myself. And yeah, I think the loan total was $17,000. And yeah, now I'm down to $500. I love that. How much more debt have you got? Have you got any other debts sitting around? Yeah. So I do use Afterpay, which I know is not necessarily the best, but I actually use it almost like a way to control how much goes out every fortnight. It's a cash flow tool. Yes. And so I do have it. I have worked with them to keep it as low as possible with the amount I'm allowed to spend. And I just use it for those little things that come up and I'm like, oh, I forgot about that and purchase that way. So tell me about how you

have negotiated with them to have it be a lower amount, because that's not easy. You can't just log online and drop it. Have you called up after pay and been like, give me less? Yeah, pretty much I sent them a message because I had gotten to a point where I think it was close to two thousand dollars or even a bit more than that that they had approved me and I was like I want to be honest I'm the most reckless and impulsive with money sometimes I don't want to be responsible for that and I don't want to owe you guys fees so I'd rather keep it under a thousand dollars or you know whatever the lowest it could be at that point in time and I think it sits at about like a thousand dollars but I wouldn't let myself get even close to that because I get a bit anxious

just in case that fortnight is the fortnight that I don't work as much or anything like that. It's stress inducing. I love that you're controlling it and using it as a cashflow tool. I obviously can be quite cynical on Afterpay. And I mean, I am with all buy now, pay later platforms, right? It's not because they're not good tools. Like Afterpay in your situation, you're working casually, we can defer some payments for things that you ultimately needed, but it's the slippery slope that they provide to people who don't see it as a form of debt. They go, well, I've afterpaid it. And it's like, well, yes, that's basically the same as using a credit card, even though you're not paying interest. Like those are things that you might

not have spent money on and it's putting you in a negative situation. So I picked up on the tone of what you were saying. You were like, oh, it's not great. But like, then you explained a really great way that you had used it and you've brought down how much you're able to even spend on that and you're responsible with it. I would say you're far more in control than you've made out to be, my friend. I wasn't when I first had it. I got it whenever it first launched. Had to learn the hard way. I had to learn the hard way. I didn't want to be responsible for that kind of debt. I like having the option. I don't always use it though. That is so fair. Are there any other debts that we haven't discussed?

Technically, yes. I do owe a little bit of money on my tax return this year. I haven't lodged it because I'm just going to put that off for a little bit. It's not a lot. I've been able to claim enough to bring that down to about, I think it's $300 that I'm going to owe the government. You know, that can wait a little second. I know it's there and I'm working towards it. You've got time.

I like that. And I like that you know in advance. Like most people don't know in advance what they're going to owe on tax. Who is this? Both of my parents work in tax. So it's helpful to be prepared and to have somebody in my corner helping me out. That feels like me, right?

Like if anybody remembers, I basically repeat the same stories over and over, but I grew up in a family, we definitely were not wealthy, but I grew up in a family where my dad was an accountant and tried to teach me money over and over and over again. And do you think I would listen? Absolutely not. And I'm sure you're in the same situation where they're trying to teach you. No, I mean, you probably didn't talk about money per se in relation to their money or what you could spend, but they would probably be trying to educate you.

and it's not until you're in a pickle that you're like, maybe I should have listened to Dad. Yeah, it's often the case. It's actually very cute. They actually met at the ATO. So cute. An ATO dream. Yeah, so they're very much, yeah, finance-focused and tax-focused.

So it's good to have in my corner now that I have my head screwed on a little bit and I will actually listen and learn. I like that. Now tell me about what you think your best money habit is. I'm always looking for a way to earn more, so I like to mystery shop so that if I want to go out for grilled, for instance, my mystery shop covers my pay and then I just get paid to eat. What's your grilled order?

Because I feel like this is very telling of somebody's personality. What are you ordering? At the moment, I am not eating a lot with baby, but I really like the, what's it called, Wild Wild West, the pineapple one. Oh, I always get pineapple on my burger. so good it is good I'm obsessed with they have the impossible burgers so I get the impossible garden goodness with grilled pineapple yeah it's fantastic I don't know why anyone wouldn't eat pineapple on their pizza or on their burger but I think it's funny that you mention it because

you're like I mystery shop to go to grilled last time I went to grilled which hilariously enough was last night my burger was like more than $20 and I was like this is a lot like the cost of living is insane. Like how did I just spend more than $20 on a single burger from arguably a takeaway location? This is to me crazy. So it's like a special treat. I'm glad that you are funding it smartly and I am not. It's so easy to do like in my spare time. So I pick up whatever job I want. So that works well. And I do always try to work as much as I can. Although again, being pregnant, it's becoming more apparent that I can't work as much as I'd like. How's that impacting you? Like the pregnancy, like are you not well? Like what does that look

like until December? Yeah. So the first three months I spent every day vomiting and when I wasn't vomiting, I was nauseous. So I wasn't a fan. Then I got good for about a month and now I'm back to being sick. So I can't work all the time and especially standing up in retail, I can't. But my other retail job, I am by appointment only. So I'm sitting down for everything, which makes life a lot easier. Yeah. But I'm just trying to work as much as I can when I can. Yeah, that was something that I planned every part of my pregnancies and didn't foresee

coming. Like, thankfully, I knew once I got pregnant pretty quickly that I wasn't very good at being pregnant. And I know that lots of people say, pregnancy is beautiful. like it's the most beautiful time of your life like yes maybe it was for you but not for me like pregnancy in general is not for me and that's okay will I do it again yeah I'll try but I won't enjoy it and I love that other people enjoy it and it doesn't make me less grateful that I can get pregnant and had a baby and all of that but like my gosh it is a ride but it looks like a

ride that's now going to financially impact you are you planning around that like what conversations are you having with your partner he is so kind and very concerned for my health which is lovely so he's actually encouraging me to step back from work a little bit he's like don't worry if there's anything that comes up that's on me like I'm the one that asked me to work less and do all of that so that's very lovely but it's also such a hard mindset for me to shift it didn't occur to me that I wouldn't be working next year like it didn't make sense to me because I have worked so much my entire life that oh wait no I actually have to stop because I'm now someone's mum and they need me it was such a mindset shift that I can't do everything all of the time no and that is literally

a full-time job like it's so insane how exhausted you become and how on you are all the time don't get me wrong it is the best job in the entire world but it is a lot like you might not be going to work anymore. But I'm sorry if you're tired now. I'm fully prepared for the fact that this is just prepping me for what it might be. No, no, no. Do you know what? And this is complete side note. A lot of people, they always say, just wait until you have the baby. It's going to get harder. No, sit down. Stop telling me. Just wait. Pregnancy tired is like no other. Like I feel better postpartum at 3am when I have a screaming baby than I ever did pregnant. Like if you go through that nauseous period, like I had HG, it sounds like you're pretty much on the

same path. It sucks being pregnant, being not pregnant, a blessing. Like you can deal with anything when you're not nauseous. Yeah. I'm grateful to be pregnant, but I am so happy when she's out of me. Yeah. Agreed. All right. So any other really good money habits? I'd say that's pretty much everything. I do have a pretty good mindset in the sense that I don't have a scarcity mindset so I just always believe that if something bad was to happen I would just earn more money I would find a different job I would do this and I think that that's what makes me partly less stressed about certain situations like I think had last year happened to me and I didn't have that mindset I would have been buried down in

the dumps for a while and kind of spiraled into a debt spiral whereas now like I'm just like no I'll just build it back up I'll earn more money when I'm healthy again and here we are that is so good all right tell me though what's your worst money habit I'm extremely impulsive and I do really love to shop and like emotionally shop as well so like when I'm feeling not my best self especially in my pregnancy I'm like but I deserve like some clothes that feel good in pregnancy or I'll deserve to buy the baby this or you know I like to treat myself a little bit but I'm getting on top of that and I think the other thing is like I don't really have much of a budget my income's always variable I kind of see what I get paid that fortnight and then kind

of work it out from there it's never hard and fast so I often get surprised by my bills but that's something I'm working on me and my partner have started to sit down we've actually got a money date booked in oh my gosh how cute which he thinks is really dorky but I think it's really cool all right sit down sir this is the sexiest thing I've ever heard yeah and so we're gonna have a proper look at what we spend, where we spend. And I said to him, it's not about judging where our money goes. It's just knowing where our money goes and if that's something that we're happy with or if we want to change it. We don't know until we know. And I feel like there's something incredibly powerful about setting up a money date, whether you are single and you are

just setting time aside for yourself to do that, or you're in a couple for a really long time and you're finally deciding to do it. I feel like setting a time and setting a date and carving out that space to have that conversation means you both enter the conversation with the right mindset. So many times, you know, I might have come home and said to Steve, we really need to be talking about our budget. And like, I've just had an hour in the car to myself. I've thought about all the things we need to do, all the things we need to change, but he wasn't ready for me to walk into the house and start talking money. You sometimes need to be in the right mind frame and setting a time, setting a date and putting it aside means that you're both entering the chat

on the same page and we can actually create a sustainable and good budget and we know who's bringing what to the table. And I just think that is so incredibly powerful. When you say you're working on a budget, have you done any pre-work for this or is this something that you're like, look the money date hasn't come up yet it's coming but we're going to do it or like have you started tracking expenses or writing down what's going on like where are we at with that I started looking back on all my like past bills so like looking at what my car insurance was this year at the beginning so that next year I have a rough idea of what's coming up or whatever it is I'm still in the habit of liking the surprise of where my money goes but I'm trying to be better

and so yeah it's mainly like the big bills and he owns his home so he pays mortgage but I pay rent good choice for baby daddy I like this Picasso it's just about like tracking what's the house expense and so I've asked him to kind of look into that as well but we haven't actually got something fully written out my sister has a pretty basic budget or hers is fantastic but she sent me something that's sort of a very basic version of hers to just get me started but I'm not really sure what I'm doing. No, I'm going to fix it for you before your money date. I'm going to give you access to our money masterclass so that you can do that. This spreadsheet in there, like I made it, so I'm biased. So take my advice however you want, but it is next level. Like you

don't even have to do a lot of the calculations because I've auto-formulated them. And you just put in all of your expenses and then it'll spit out where you're spending it, what bank accounts it needs to go in, what this looks like, how it might work for you. And you can even put in like money goals and what that looks like. You go, here is my income. These are my expenses. And then you go to the next sheet and it'll be like, okay, money diarist, you have this much left over from your budget to spend on your goals. What's your emergency fund going to be looking like? And then the next page, once you've put all that in, it's like, all right, here's the cashflow system. Every single week, you need to transfer X to this account, X to this account. And don't forget,

Redjo, that's going to come up in six months, but we're saving for it over here. And I'm obsessed with it probably because I made it but I'm going to give you that and then you could fill all of that in before your money date and your partner's going to be like okay wizard no worries thank you so much I was trying to write my own one and that's when I resorted to asking my sister because I was like I don't understand excel I don't know how to use it it's hard and overwhelming if you don't get it but don't worry you can't muck this up because I've actually locked every single cell in it so you can only put numbers in and change like the names for things you can't break it because I've locked it. Fantastic. That's what I need in my life.

I was like, when I made it, I literally laughed and was like, I'm going to lock this down so that no one can mess with my formulas because I don't need someone accidentally messing with a formula and then getting like the wrong output and then I'd be mortified. So no, we've like doubled down and I've even highlighted, these are the only boxes you can fill in. You can change the names here. That's it. Okay, good. It sounds like it's, yeah, for me. So far, so good. People tell me it's foolproof. We love that. Money diarist, I have a bit of a bone to pick with you though. So I'll be nice to you. I'll give you the money masterclass, but now you've got to sit down because I need to have a hard word with you. You said I used to be an F and I was like, great, good reflection,

but I'm now an E. And I was like, okay, this is good. Let's have this conversation. you then went on to explain that you know you've got the goal of creating an emergency fund you've already planned you know what Centlink is going to look like for mat leave you've clearly got a very supportive partner who's you know making sure that you're putting yourself in the best possible position while you're going through this pregnancy you knew off the top of your head what your super was you have shares like you're an actual investor not only are you an investor You invested in 2021 $1,000 and now it's up to $1,800. You're also on shares. I fully anticipated someone who said that they were an E to say, no, I actually don't invest yet. They

no idea even what it is. And that's not an issue. That was just my expectation. You then went on to say, I had a car loan of $17,000, brought my mom in to negotiate it down because I'm a genius and that's what I should have done. Didn't like the payments. So V, guess what I did? Tripled them. So I only have $500 left on that debt. I know exactly what I'm earning in my retail jobs. Not only do I have a retail job, I have two of them and I work six days a week. I'm also pregnant. What the heck? You also explained how you're using Afterpay as a cashflow tool, but knew yourself so well that you didn't want $2,000 on it. So negotiated them down, actually got in contact with them and said, can you please bring down my limit? No one does

that. In advance, you know what your tax return is going to be and you're literally cash planning in your head to, look, I know that I've got time and I don't have to submit my tax return yet, so I'm not going to because I'm probably going to have to pay them $300. Let's put that off a little bit. You are smarter than the average bear. If you had heard this money story about anybody else would you have been like yeah v and e is fair no i think i'm a bit harder on myself than i would like to be you think well i think it comes from like all the past me and now that we kind of talk about it i can see that i've made a lot more growth you absolutely have and then on top of that i can tell you're letting your money story define who you are like yes you've come from

a wealthy family and subsequently you learn, according to you, no money skills. But I would say that you do have good money skills and are being super harsh on yourself, but you cannot let yourself be defined by your money story. Like you're the one that's currently in control of your money story and where you're going and what that's going to look like and how you and your partner deal with cash and then how you and your partner have a baby and how you communicate money conversations around her like an e hypothetically if you were to become an a what kind of work do you think that would take i think i would like to be out of debt and i'd like to have my like emergency fund sort of sorted so that i could start saving for like other bits and pieces because

like i said i'm still impulsive so i think i'd want to get on top of that a little bit before I could say for certain that I'm an A, but I think if I'm being kinder on myself, maybe I'm a C right now, but working my way up. I love that. I feel like sometimes we get money diarists on and it's this beautiful reflection that maybe they're not doing as bad as they thought they would. And I think the thing that I love about this is you said, look, I really want to get on top of my debt. I really want to create an emergency fund. I really want to shift my mindset a bit, but you're so aware of that. People who aren't changing and are genuinely an E or an F at money, they're not talking about shifting their mindset. They're not talking about

getting on top of debt and having an emergency fund, both of which are very bright lights in the tunnel at the moment because we know you're about to get on top of your debt. We know that you're planning to organize an emergency fund. I like that you're a C. I can see that becoming an is definitely in your future. But I have loved this money diary. I feel like it is such a good reminder that we are all so harsh on ourselves until we like zoom out. We have thousands of people that write in to share their money stories with us. And I'm so grateful for that. But even if you don't end up on the show, maybe sitting down and writing out your money story and answering all of the money story questions like, you know, what is your attitude towards money? What would

you grade yourself? What are your goals? How much are you spending? Are you investing? Are you in debt? And actually sitting down and going, well, what does this actually look like? I think so many of us would regrade ourselves and go, actually, I'm doing pretty well and I'm pretty proud of myself. So I hope that people, after listening to your money story, go, if she thought she was an E and got upgraded to a C, I could probably do the same. I hope so. I think that's what I wanted to come on because as much as I love hearing everybody who's fantastic I also wanted to come on and be an inspiration for somebody who's in the same situation as me. I did think it was going to go into unrelatable territory when you did say I've got about 180 and I was like sorry

what like thousand in shares like this just became not the diary I'd anticipated but money dourist sadly we've run out of time but I have adored having this conversation with you I'm so excited for everything that's in your future. I'm so excited that you get to go on the parenting journey and that you're getting all your money together. I get extra excited when people are only a couple of hundred dollars off paying off their debt. Like, it's a good time to be talking about money.

So, Money Dyrus, thank you so much. I've adored this and I know our community will as well. Thank you so much. I've really loved chatting to you. It's changed my opinion of myself a little bit, which is lovely. Good. Oh, my gosh. Thank you so much.

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