She's On The Money - The Truth About Big Tech Money From Someone Living It

Episode Date: April 13, 2025

You’ve probably heard the hype: tech jobs = massive salaries. But can you still get a slice of the pie if you don’t work in a technical role? This week’s Money Diarist is here to say… yes, you absolutely can. She’s in her early 30s, earning up to $650K "total comp" a year and building her dream home. But her path into tech was anything but traditional. No coding background, just a string of gutsy moves, lucky breaks, and saying yes before she felt “ready.” We talk about what big tech money actually looks like behind the scenes: the shares, the bonuses, the six-figure tax bills, the lifestyle creep... and the pressure that comes with it all. She’s open, honest, and full of wisdom about building wealth in a world that wasn’t necessarily built for her. If you’ve ever looked at a job description and thought, “I don’t tick all the boxes, so I won’t apply,” this one’s your sign to rethink what’s possible. Ready to binge more relatable, inspiring, and downright juicy money stories? Check out our ultimate Money Diaries playlist. Listen now Join our Facebook Group AKA the ultimate support network for money advice and inspiration. Ask questions, share tips, and celebrate your wins with a like-minded crew of 300,000+. And follow us on Instagram for Q&As, bite-sized tips, daily money inspo... and relatable money memes that just get you.  Acknowledgement of Country By 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 that lets you be pervy about other people's money habits for educational purposes of course welcome back to another one of our Money Diaries, where I get the absolute pleasure of talking to one of our beautiful She's on the Money community members all about their journey. This week, we got a message and it sounded exactly like this. Dear She's on the Money, I'm 33 and currently building my dream home, something that simply wouldn't have been possible without my job in the tech sector. I'm not in a technical role and I didn't take a traditional path to get here. It took a lot of determination, a few lucky breaks and saying yes to opportunities that felt a little bit out of reach at the time.

I'm sharing this to encourage others to explore the tech space even if your background doesn't seem like the perfect fit. There's a real opportunity in this industry and it can be incredibly lucrative. But this often comes with unpredictability. Just three months into my role, half my team was laid off. That experience taught me a lot about future planning. Money Diarist, when I heard that this was your story or saw it in our inbox, I was like, get her on the podcast. This will be so interesting. So I'm excited to chat to you. But before we get there, as always, I have to ask everybody the same question. Money Diarist, if I asked you to give your money habits a grade from A through to F, what grade would you give

them? I'm thinking I'll give myself a B, maybe a B plus. I love that. Now, my favorite question. in. Can you tell us a little bit more about your money story? Yeah, totally. My attitude towards money, I think, was very much shaped by my upbringing, which I didn't realize until I was thinking about my story. I grew up in, I guess, what you would call a middle-class household, but money was pretty variable when I was growing up. We moved around a bit. Sometimes both my parents were working, sometimes just my dad. We always had enough, but money was sometimes quite tight, especially when I was younger. Both my parents come from Eastern Europe and they both grew up during communism and neither of them had very

much back in those days. My mom would tell me stories of how she would get an orange for Christmas because it was so hard to find otherwise. It's just a completely different way of life. And so I think for them, it was really important to work hard and create something for themselves, I kind of put a stake in the ground. So when I was younger, they pulled all their resources into building a house for us. And it was pretty stressful at the time because I think their ambitions were a little bit bigger than their means. I think we didn't really have enough money to fully complete the house.

And I saw it caused them a lot of anxiety, a lot of stress. Like I remember as a kid, I would try to not ask them for things because I knew that it would just contribute to that stress more and more. and so yeah once the house was done enough we moved in but it was half finished for many years so it was kind of like living half construction site half in an actual house and then yeah later later things improved we were a little bit more comfortable as I got older and went to high school but we never really talked about money my dad mentioned having some investments we never really discussed it but I think from a really early age my parents really instilled this idea of like

financial stability is super important and they didn't want me and my sister to go through the challenges that they went through. And so looking back, I think my attitude towards money is very much based on this idea that not having enough money can cause a lot of stress, a lot of anxiety and that money, yeah, plays, I guess, an important role in building stability, in kind of giving you control giving you freedom and so yeah seeing them struggle early on I kind of realized that I don't want to feel that way and so that's I guess influenced some of my trajectory and as I've entered my working life I've really kind of kept that in the back of my mind which yeah has ended up with me working in tech I've always been pretty interested in people and

technology and I've kind of managed to carve myself a path that combines both of those things but yeah I'm not gonna lie like a big draw of working in tech early on in my life was its ability to kind of set me up for the future yeah totally and I feel like we all hear it right like you can make heaps of money in tech but like then I guess the conversation up until today has really stopped like you go okay cool I'm not technical or I don't understand it so I don't know what that means you are 33 now what age were you when you first started working like was this like your first job? Were you like, okay, cool. I'm 18, fresh out of school and we are going to work in tech or what did that journey look like? I think at the back of my mind, I was like,

I'd love to work in tech, but it was a bit of a pipe dream at the time. I come from a social sciences background. So I studied psychology, which I think you did as well. I did. So similar, similar path, but different, yeah, much different outcomes. But yeah, I started, my first job was actually in government, but I think in the back of my mind, I was always thinking, you know, tech is a, it's an area that I'm really interested in and I think it's something that I want to move towards. And so through these kind of little, I call them little half steps, I started to move closer and closer to the type of role that I really wanted to have. And so from my government role, I was really fortunate to get a job at a small startup. I wrote a really kind of desperate

cover letter. And, you know, that idea that women don't apply for roles that they don't meet like a hundred percent criteria for. I really chant. I love this though. I was channeling that energy and I was like, yeah, I think I met maybe 20% of that criteria, but whatever, but you got the job. Yeah. I wrote a really passionate cover letter and I looked back at it. No, we don't look back. We don't look back. That was so silly. It was so cringe. But you know what? Is it cringe if it worked? Yeah, it worked. I think the lucky thing is I'm a real people person and my interview, because it was a startup was with the CEO. His dog was in the room and his dog loved me. And I think he took it as a sign dogs know though dogs know good people yeah I bring my dog to every

single recording I do and she and I are on the same page if she doesn't like somebody she lets me know by giving them absolutely no attention which is very strange from her but when you know you know dogs know yeah so that was my lucky break I was 24 at the time so that was my first kind of foray into the tech world and then since then yeah it's been a series of I guess deliberate next steps that I've taken going from startup to slightly larger tech company to where I find myself now which is kind of super big tech company I suppose so that's how I ended up here. So talk to me about what that actually means so what is your job title like what do you do for work and how much money do you earn? So I'm a user experience researcher and for my salary so

compensation and big tech is often kind of referred to as total comp, total compensation, which includes salary. It includes shares bonuses. So there's a few different components that make up my total income. My base salary is 200,000. Oh, very nice. It is very nice. Yeah. Very, very fortunate to have that. And that includes super. So that's all included in there. and then a significant portion of my compensation is in shares. Oh, okay. Yeah. This number fluctuates a lot, especially in recent times. And yeah, it can go up and down really significantly throughout the year, but annually it works out to be anywhere between

$200,000 to $400,000 before tax. What? It's a lot, yeah. So how does tax on that work? So you're based in New Zealand. So this is going to be slightly different when answering it. But if you're being issued like between $200,000 and $400,000 worth of shares, are you having to pay tax on that asset acquisition? And what does that mean for like your cash flow? Because to me, I'm like, oh, like everybody's probably thinking, oh, that's great. And I'm like, hold on, hold on. You're giving me this and I'm incurring a massive

tax bill. Like what's the deal? Yeah. Yeah. It looks like, you know, all that money is like wow such like it is a huge amount of money regardless of the tax but you do pay income tax on it and you are responsible for paying that yourself so I have to pay that annually I basically end up with a massive tax bill and my tax bill is so large that I end up having to pay it in installments throughout the year so for example last year every four months I was stung with a $40,000 tax bill that I had to pay but also in the long run like we're not complaining. This is just like part of the cashflow problem, right? Like more money, more problems. But the more cashflow you have, obviously I'm assuming that would mean the more shares would

be being issued to you. So even if you quote earned more, I'm assuming this whole total compensation package would increase. So you're always going to have this problem, but I'll pay tax to get a massive asset, but it has to be a value to you, right? Like if you didn't value you shares or anything, like you'd be like, absolutely not. It's a bit, it stings a lot the first time you do it. And you almost have to check yourself sometimes because you go, this is so unfair. And then I realized that this is absolutely fair. Yeah. You're like, oh, okay. Like the entire reason I'm getting these shares is because the company doesn't have the cashflow to pay me half a million dollars a year. And so they're giving me assets and that's going to make me wealthy

because I'm assuming you work for a business that you really believe in. So you're assuming that these shares are going to increase in value, right? A hundred percent. Yeah. And it's funny you say that. Sometimes I talk to my workmates because no one else can really relate to this problem. Totally. I can't talk to my friends about it because they'll just go, what are you talking about? It's unrelatable. And also like, oh no, big worldwide problem. Oh, money diarist has to pay tax because her workplace remunerated her so well. I get it. Yeah. Yeah. It's not the best thing to talk about, but it is a real, I guess, challenge and something you need to stay across. It's also a cashflow issue. Like you have, like at the end of the day, as much as like,

you know, I think people listen to money diaries because like we're so pervy about other people's situations. We're not expecting that every single person is super relatable. Like, but the idea that you're like, Hey, I'm going to tell you about this situation. How cool. We now know that there are some businesses that do total compensation and salary packages and shares. And that's what this means. If people are being issued shares, they're now responsible for their own tax. And that means that that $200,000 salary package you're getting, you're probably actually earning closer to $100,000 when it comes down to it because you're having to allocate so much of that post-tax income to paying tax on this asset that you're building. Am I correct?

Absolutely. Yeah. And your tax goes up as well. So you end up hitting much higher tax brackets, you end up paying more tax. I have come up with a bit of a system to help me manage that. So with shares that you get access to them in my company every three months. So they vest every three months and I sell, I usually always sell my shares just to kind of not have all my eggs in one basket. But what I do is I sell off my shares and then I allocate a portion to that to tax and I put it in a high interest savings account until I have to pay it. So I'm kind of trying to make the most of that money before I actually have to pay that tax. So there's a bit of technicality in there, but yeah, it works. Yeah, absolutely. When you say you sell off shares,

are you selling off shares like immediately when you get them or are you selling them off like after a couple of years? Like I'm only asking because in Australia, if you have a share for less than 12 months, you're hit with like much higher capital gains tax and like much higher tax rates than if you hold them for more than 12 months. Is that something that you experience? So, in New Zealand, we don't have a capital gains tax. It must be nice. Unrelatable. It must be nice.

It is nice. Okay, that's nice. Okay, we can stop talking about this now because I might get jealous. But my workmates who are based in Australia, yeah, they have to do that. And I guess the strategy there really depends. That's so rude that you get out of it and then you're like, ha-ha, have fun over there. Have fun on the other side of the ditch where tax sucks. I mean Australia's got a lot of good things going for it as well so

no no I like how like it sounds lame but I do really like our tax system I think it is incredibly like there are definitely always places that we could fix and do different things but I think we have a very fair tax system for the economy that we've built yeah yeah this tax is interesting but you know at the end of the day I love knowing that that money is being allocated to you know the courses that need it. And yeah, it's not money that I would rather keep. It makes sense to have to pay it. I should also add as part of my total compensation, there's salary shares. There's also a bonus that I get. So on top of everything else, there is a 20%, I guess, performance-based bonus that I get. And obviously that can vary as well. So annually that's, yeah, depending on how well

I do in my role, it can be up to 20% of my salary. So I guess in total, I mean, it's a significant amount of cash, but it can be anywhere between like $480 to $650 annually a year. As a cash bonus? No, that's total. That's total. So the cash bonus is 20% of the annual salary. Oh my goodness. That is a lot of money to be dealing with. Talk to me about like, this is just exciting. I like it getting pervy. Like you've got like when you give women money, you give them power. And if they've got power, they can create really cool things. So talk to me about your big money goals. Like what are you currently working towards? Yeah, I'm kind of in my

like while the sun shines make hay era. And so I think in the back of my mind, I'm very aware of the fact that like when tech is good, tech is great. And this is not going to last forever. like I've been super fortunate to have joined my company at a time where shares were low so they have increased in value quite a lot since I've been there and I'm trying to be really mindful of like making sure that I do this money justice and I use it wisely and I kind of set myself up for success and so I guess we've kind of come full circle with the story that I described earlier on with my upbringing but my big goal at the moment is to build my own house my partner and I just bought a house right before Christmas. That's so exciting.

It's the proverbial worst house on the best street. Good. That's what we want to see. That was the plan. We're very handy. So we're going to spend the next year doing it up. So we're not living there right now, but in the next 12 months, hopefully, yeah, we're going to be living in it. The goal is, to create our dream home, I suppose. And as we do that, try to keep the mortgage on that house as little as possible. And I think that goes back to the fact that I'm very aware of the fact that tech is pretty unstable. There's a lot of, I guess, job insecurity and I don't want to end up in a position where I've overcommitted myself to an amazing big house with a big mortgage,

assuming I'm going to be making lots of money forever. I think, yeah, it's important for me to make sure that that mortgage is as little as possible so I'm not stressing out. And is that, would you say, the biggest goal is smashing down your mortgage? I think in the next few years, yes. I want to kind of make the most of this high income I have and try to just not be stressed about money. Like I think it goes back to that anxiety of if something happens, I want to not have a huge burden on myself. It's unlikely that I'd be able to find a job earning this much ever again, probably, but I just want to keep it manageable. Yeah. It's not something you just walk straight into.

Absolutely not. It's a very temporary thing. And yeah, so build the house and then hopefully with time also look at kind of other investments potentially using some of the equity in that house. But yeah, that's one thing at a time. That's kind of a future thing for us to think about. Yeah, that is very cool. All right, let's go to a really quick break because on the flip side, I want to learn a little bit more about your investments. I had to hold myself back earlier before like diving in. And then we're going to talk about debt and best and worst money habits. So guys, don't go anywhere. All right, Money Diaries, we are back and I need to talk more about your investments. So each and every single year, your work is giving you between $200,000

to $400,000 worth of shares. Like that is, I would say it's not unheard of, but it's not often heard of. And I just think that is so exciting. Talk to me about what you're currently investing in. how much is your portfolio worth now? And like you mentioned that you're selling off a lot of shares. What are you doing with that cash? Like what are we doing to invest for our futures? Yeah, absolutely. So I'll start from the top. I, until recently, I actually did have an investment property. So my first home, I bought an apartment right before COVID with the intent of living in it. That was also when I got with my now current partner. And so as COVID happened, I very quickly rented that out so my first home very quickly became an investment property and I have recently

just sold that actually last week. Oh very recently. Very recently and so that's going to help us pay for building our house and a significant portion of that will go towards creating the dream home so I suppose that's no longer an investment but it was an investment until recently and in terms of shares so obviously I've got the shares from my employer and the way that works is when I first joined my organization, I got a kind of set of shares that they allocated to me over a four-year period. So every year I get access. Vesting. Yeah, vesting over four years and so I got them allocated at quite a good price. So the price that you get them allocated at is the day you start basically and so that's why the shares have

increased in value quite a lot. So it's not like they give me 200k's worth of shares every year but it is based on that initial grant that I got, which has increased a lot just because the company's been doing pretty well since then. How good is that? So just to not butt in, but give a little bit of context to those listening, when you get allocated shares in this way, I use the word vested before and essentially vested is like a, I would say a legal term for promised. And it's essentially saying, and I'll ask a few other questions in a hot second, but it's essentially saying that when she started, she was promised X amount of shares and it might have been like 10 shares. And then over time, this is the vesting part, she will be given those

shares, but it doesn't just happen upfront because otherwise there's no incentive to work hard, but there will be an incentive to wait until your shares are vested. So this could happen over like, and I'll ask you in a second what yours is, but it could happen over 12 months. It could happen over two years, three years. I've seen share vesting agreements that are like 10 years long where every single year you get like two or 3% of the shares that you're allocated. And I just think it's so interesting to know more about that. But when you joined, do you remember the number of shares that were vested to you? I don't remember the number of shares specifically, but I remember the amount that it was. And it was about, at that point, probably about $600,000 over four years.

Oh, wow. Yeah. And then that's obviously increased in value. Do you know on average what it would be worth now? Like obviously you haven't gotten access to it, but like total? Yeah, total. I did look recently and it was over a million dollars. Oh my God. How cool is that? It was crazy to see that number. Again, pre-tax. So there's almost half a million dollars worth of tax to pay. That's okay. It's not the point. Like they're not looking at that right now. But yeah, it's a, I guess, life-changing amount of money.

Oh, absolutely. So talk to me about this. So vesting agreements, there's lots of different vesting agreements. How long is your term? Like how many years is it over? So mine originally was over four years and initially it was what they call a one-year cliff. So I didn't get any for the first year. After the first year, now I get access to, I think it's like 4.25% of my shares every three months. And really the incentive there is to keep me there for as long as possible. Absolutely it is. Otherwise, why would they give you that? Because at the end of the day, they've obviously seen you as like great talent and been like, we need to lock this woman in because this industry is so lucrative. Like you could go

and get another job tomorrow and be paid really well, they're assuming, but they got to lock you in for a long period of time because you're doing user experience, right? Like you said, you are a user experience researcher. The longer that you're doing that, the more value you are to their company like you're just really understanding their clientele right absolutely yeah and I think yeah it's great to be in a company that recognizes that of course you know it is a big driver for keeping people there as well and I think there's this notion and tick of like golden handcuffs where even if you want to leave a job you're stuck because your shares haven't vested or like there's too big of a carrot dangling right yeah and on the flip side as well you know if you get

laid off, which does happen. You just lose everything. You use everything. So you look at that million dollars and suddenly it's gone and it can be hard to plan around that. And so going back to investments, I kind of treat those shares a little bit like I kind of call it monopoly money because... Yeah, until it's in your cold hard hands. Like I just, yeah, like you don't also want the heartbreak of like, what if something happens and you were like making life plans based on those shares vesting and then they don't. So if you leave, do you get to keep the shares that you've already had vested to you and you lose the rest? Like how does that work? Yeah. So everything that you've been granted up until that point is yours. And then anything that you haven't received

yet is just disappears. My goodness. And I'm being so pervy. How long have you worked at this role? I've been there for almost two and a half years. So what happens at four years when all of your shares have vested, are they going to like vest you more shares to stay longer? Or like what happens then? Yeah. So every, and obviously they want to keep you there for a bit longer than four years. So they give you an allocation every year when we do performance reviews. So apart from just a bonus, they give you kind of a little carrot of additional shares and those shares also get allocated on a four year basis. So you end up in a situation where you always have new shares coming up and that kind of carrot dangling there for you to keep going. Yeah which is smart from them but

also and I mean you're making a lot of money and that's fantastic and you clearly enjoy your job but what if one day you woke up and you weren't enjoying your job like what would be your situation then? I think that would be a really hard look at my current circumstances and I guess knowing when enough is enough because I think that is something that is in the back of my mind. working in a big tech company, it is quite demanding and it is competitive and we do have quite a lot of pressure on us to perform. And I think that there could very easily be a point at which I realized that this is no longer serving me. I'm not enjoying it. And when I decide to leave, I will be leaving some money on the table regardless of when I decide to do that.

You have to because otherwise you're not performing and then you're not getting shares vested to you at your performance review, at which point I'm assuming they would lay you off. So you're going to lose something. So for me, it's getting to a point where hopefully I have my house by then that I enjoy living in and I can take the foot off the gas a little bit and decide to do something else and have, I guess, enough of an emergency fund or enough money to tie me over to figure out what's next for me. But yeah, I think having a bit of that plan and really thinking about what that future without this job could look like is something that I think about quite a lot because it's not guaranteed. And also, yeah, I will have

to leave it one day and know what happens then. Like, I don't want to get used to it. Yeah, fair. But it sounds like you're trying to make hay while the sun is shining. You mentioned that when you get your shares, you often just sell them off, which is so nice because you don't have any capital gains tax. But on the flip side, I need to know, what are you doing with that money? Is that just going into your house deposit savings? Is that going into another like share portfolio? Like what's the plan? Yeah. So it has changed a little bit recently. So I paid off the mortgage on my first home and that was my main goal. That's crazy. That's so cool. That is so cool. It was amazing. Yeah. It's like, oh yeah, I just paid

off my first mortgage. Sit down. That is so cool. It was a baby mortgage. It was a one bedroom place, but I was really proud of myself. Yeah. To pay that off. And yeah, five years. Five years. Five years. I just paid it off over five years. Unrelatable. No, no, but it's not, you know what, who cares about unrelatable? Like, it's just so cool that you got to do that. Like, especially going back, can we just remember that you were telling us how your parents are from Eastern European descent and they experienced communism and your mum got oranges for Christmas. Like, and now you're like, yes, I paid off my whole ass house in five years like are they just like so proud of you because they would be mind

blown that the child that they had is now capable of this yeah they're super super proud but it's funny you say that because the first I mentioned some of the job hopping I did early in my career and the first tech job I got my mom was super proud of me and she was like this is amazing this is great then when I told her that I was leaving that job and I was I got another offer and I was going somewhere else she thought I was bonkers she thought why would you throw away the stability the money what are you doing and she almost yelled at me she was like really I mean she's not wrong like from her background that's of such value yeah she was already proud of me then but then you know I said this is how much I'm going to be making and suddenly she was like oh

she's like are you sure did they muck up because that's fake money yeah yeah I think for them it's really hard to relate I mean my parents barely understand what I do for work so for them yeah it's hard for them to relate but they're super proud and I think you know seeing me go through the same thing of you know now creating my house not having to do it under a whole bunch of stress I think they're just really proud to see that the sacrifices and the challenges they had are no longer something that I'm having to do myself so 100% and like it's so nice to wrap back to that story that you shared with us at the start because it's just like yeah you mentioned it's unrelatable. Totally. But like, we're not in isolation having this conversation about someone

paying off their mortgage in five years and not giving you the context and the how and literally the playbook of, okay, well, if you also wanted to work in tech, these are the opportunities on the table. Like we're sharing this so that people can learn and people can grow and be inspired because my friend, if you can do it, like there are opportunities on the table for other women to do something similar. And I just, I'm so excited about that. Like, and that's why we're sharing these stories because like, imagine how cool it would be if we get a message saying, oh, I just, I put my hat in the ring and I got my first job in tech and I've like doubled my salary, which we totally know, like you and I know is completely possible if somebody wanted

to do that. Like imagine that type of stuff coming out of you sharing your story, which we know is going to happen. Like, that's so cool. I would love to hear those stories. Girlfriend, when it comes up, I will absolutely share it with you. But tell me a bit more about this investment plan. You've got a house, you paid it off, you just sold your house, you're building a dream home. Are you planning on expanding and having a bigger investment portfolio or what does that look like? Yeah. So alongside, I guess, paying off my mortgage while I was doing that, I was also trying to build up money to help myself in the case of emergencies or in the case that something was to happen to my job. So I started

investing pretty aggressively over the last, I think, you know, year, year and a half when my income allowed me to put, you know, significant amounts of money aside. So for a period of time, I was trying to invest about 20% of my income. So now I've got about $130,000 in Sharesies. Oh, how cool. In Sharesies, did you say? In Sharesies. I love Sharesies. I love this. And it's from your side of the ditch. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. And I love how easy they make it and I just love all the content that they produce. So big Sharesies fan. Me too. Don't worry, girlfriend. But like,

I'm not even doing that because they pay me. Like I'm literally obsessed with them. Yeah. Yeah. I've seen them, their team speak locally and talk about their journey. So yeah, super inspired and want to support them. Obviously now that I'm saving to, you know, do a huge renovation on our house, I've dropped back some of the investments, but I am still investing just to keep the habit up. Oh, I love this for you. So we're investing. Talk to me about debt. So you've just, before Christmas, you purchased a house with your partner. How much debt are you in now? Yeah. So our house, we bought it for $990,000 and the mortgage on that at the moment is $880,000,

which I'm currently paying off myself. My partner's got a house that we live in currently, so he's paying off that mortgage and I'm paying off the mortgage for our future home. Yeah, how cool. So you're in New Zealand. What does a $990,000 purchase get you? Like what type of property are we buying? Because in Melbourne, like and in Sydney, that gets you two bedroom, really nice apartment, but like it might not buy you land anymore. I mean, further out, absolutely. But like in Melbourne and Sydney, which are obviously capital, capital-ish cities, you don't get a lot anymore for under a million dollars so what did you get to purchase? Yeah so I think the New Zealand property market has dropped significantly in recent years and

I'm looking at what's happening in Australia and it's completely different to what's happening over here. It's wild it's such a different market. Yeah so we got pretty lucky we managed to buy a very big house which is almost 250 square meters. Oh my goodness that's like nearly the size of the block i own like so it's about four bedrooms two bathrooms and about 600 meters of land oh my god how good yeah it is a hundred years old and it is unlivable it is in a really bad state and so i think a lot of people didn't want to touch it yeah because you can't just move in yeah yeah so it's got a lot of work to do i think we're planning to put about maybe 500 to 600 thousand into it over the next year. But then it's going to be your dream home.

Exactly. Yeah. I love that. And like in terms of proximity to your closest capital city, what does that look like? It's literally five kilometers from the CBD. Oh my God. Okay. That is so cool. So it's basically like a $1.5 million property once it all comes out in the wash. Like that's what it costs you. I love that. And are you planning on smashing this mortgage down as aggressively? Like obviously you're saving for the renos and stuff. Is that all going to be in cash or are you extending your mortgage for that? Yeah. So the goal is to not have to go back to the bank. So we're trying to fund all of the renovation with what we have in cash and the shares from my employer and our salaries and

savings and things like that. And then yeah, once we're ready to move in, the plan is for my partner to sell the house we currently live in and just try to bring that mortgage down to be as little as possible so that we don't have a big mortgage coming out every month. So fair. And then let's say you still work in tech and you're still making the same amount and you now have no mortgages, like what would the plan there be? Is it like expand your property portfolio? Is it like double down on investing in shares? Like what would that look like after you smash these mortgages out, which I have no doubt you'll do in another five years or something. As long as I stay employed, fingers crossed.

I have no doubt. It sounds like they really value you. Thank you. I'm in two minds about it. On one hand, I hear a lot about property. I see a lot of people I know investing in property. And I guess I have inadvertently dabbled in it a little bit myself. I'm not sure if I love property as an investment. I think I quite like the idea of investing my money in shares and being able to draw down on it you know every yeah every year just have a little bit of I guess like passive income coming through shares I might change my mind about that but I think at this point in time I find the idea of investing in property to be a little bit of a hassle totally and I think that each to their own obviously but it's like me like

I just look at property and go oh there's like a heap of risk and heap of overheads and you also need a lot of money to get started and they don't have a lot of ongoing upkeep. Like for me, I'm like, hello, share market. But for other people, they go, no, it's bricks and mortar and I feel really secure with this. So like it's literally based on your personal decisions, which is honestly why I find investing so interesting. Now, with the income that you've got, with the background that you have and all of the things that you've achieved thus far and will in the near future, what do you think your best money habit is? Because I think that we could learn a lot from you. I think the best habit I have is that despite earning a lot, I still try to stay

quite frugal in some areas. So for me, that's things like, you know, cooking something that lasts three days, not eating out too much, you know, doing my own nails at home rather than paying for it. And sometimes I think recently I've been like challenging myself and creating my own little money challenges. But a recent one that I had was not spending any money on Uber Eats or takeaways. I don't know if that's possible for me. Unless I make that money elsewhere. Oh, that's cute. Yeah. Through selling something on Trade Me or Marketplace. That could turn into Uber Eats money. That's Uber Eats money. If I get some kind of voucher from a friend or through work, that's Uber Eats money. Oh, I love that. I couldn't stick to it.

but in theory, that sounds fantastic. Sometimes I do little like online surveys or participate in market research just to fund my Uber. And you're like, that is a burger. Yeah. So that's my Uber fund and Uber doesn't get paid in cash. Uber is like a treat. And I think that's really helped me because even though I love convenience, I still, yeah, in the back of my mind, I still know that like every dollar counts. And again, like secondhand shopping. I grew up with my mum who loved thrifting and that's really stuck with me. And I do think that sometimes when I think about it, like I do see a little maybe like trace

of communism still in my blood where I reuse things. I try to get a good deal. I don't buy things I don't need. That's part of our money story though. And I kind of like, as long as it's not causing you trauma, I think it's kind of sweet that you have things that you've kind of inherited from your parents. Like it's so nice to be like, that's so my mum of me. Yeah. And I think my parents really helped me like have two feet on the ground at all times. You know, they really instilled that in us really strongly when we were growing up. And so I try not to get too carried away with my own spending and keep things manageable and yeah, don't get carried away too much. Totally. The other thing that I'm seeing that you're really good at that you haven't

identified, but you did mention earlier is that you're really good at throwing your hat in the ring. Like it is not that common to meet a woman who says that at 24, she wrote a really convinced cover letter and then met with the CEO and got her dream role, which was like the stepping stone and like your quote, lucky break. You explained it as in an industry she wanted to get into like so many women, as you said, wait until they meet a hundred percent of the criteria before they apply for a job. Like, I think a good money habit is just backing yourself. You're like, nope, I could totally do that. Like, and I am completely going to back myself into this. And like, I don't think it's a lucky break. I think it was like someone identified the tenacity

that you had and realized that you would be a really good staff member. There was nothing that luck had to do with this. And I just, I think that that is also a really good money habit that you probably haven't identified, but I would hope that people are taking from this episode because I'm just like, oh my God, like you're just getting it done. You're like, how hard can it be? I could do that. That's fine. Did I meet 20% of the criteria? Yes. But also I'm really good at talking and I would like you to sit down and listen. And I just think that's so cool. Thanks for saying that. Yeah, I think I don't recognize that enough, but I do help, you know, when I'm helping my friends like, you know, find jobs or apply. You're their hype girl.

I'm their hype girl. And I always think there's no harm in trying. Just try. I know what's the worst they could say. No. And you go, oh, thank you for the opportunity. Moving on. Yeah. So I think you owe it to yourself to try. Worst case scenario, you don't hear back. Best case scenario leads to a conversation or maybe a job or maybe a career change. So cool. See, that's a very good habit. Like I like that your habit is being the ultimate hype girl for your friends. That's a very good habit. You're making them a lot of money. 10 out of 10. Bringing the mood down though, what's your worst money habit? I think I've got two. So one of them is I don't budget. And despite having a lot of money coming in and like despite educating myself with podcasts and books and listening to money diaries, I don't

have a good sense of how much I actually have coming in and coming out. And I do feel like there's a lot I could optimize to really get the most out of it and to be really smart with the money that I am making at the moment. So I think for me, I don't know what has blocked me or stopped me from doing it. I imagine it's because I don't need to budget. So it's not budgeting for necessity, but it's budgeting for making sure that I'm, yeah, I guess making the most of this situation and setting myself up for the future as well as possible. And what's your second one? So despite my best efforts and what I just mentioned about trying to be frugal,

there is a little bit of lifestyle creep creeping into my world. You're aware of it. We love a self-aware queen. Thank you. Thank you. I do try to keep it at bay as much as I can, but I love to travel and I love to travel comfortably so quickly my economy flights have creeped into premium economy territory and my Airbnb search filters have expanded a little bit a little bit it's so frustrating once you've experienced the front of the plane you're like why can't I always sit here it's just it's funny I was trying to explain it to somebody the other day and like, I'm aware that this is incredibly privileged. I'm not saying

something that's relatable here, but like you sit at the front of the plane, you understand what it feels like. But to me, when I get that experience and usually it's because of my points, I'm not paying it or it's just because like, I've used my points smartly. I feel like the holiday starts when you get to the airport. Whereas when you are, you know, flying economy and like, there's nothing wrong with that at all. And I still do it. And I've just booked economy flight somewhere because I'm like I'm not wasting that many points like the upgrade was not worth it I feel like I don't start the holiday until I get to the destination because like it's just not as like there's nothing relaxing about being on the plane unless you're at the very front of the plane again

very entitled but like once you've experienced it you just go wow so this is how the other half live maybe I should care a little bit more about points collecting or you know being able to upgrade or what flight specials are on because you just, you get a taste of the good life and that's what lifestyle creep is, right? A hundred percent. Yeah. And I've been trying really hard to balance it and also not to feel too guilty about it as well. Like I sometimes forget that I need to celebrate the fact that I am in this position. And so, yeah, it's not necessarily a bad habit, but it is something that sometimes I look back and go, I didn't really have to stay there. You know, I would have had just as much of a good time if I had taken a different flight or stayed

at a different place and maybe I would have had a better time. Totally. Well, I can't help you with that one. Like lifestyle creep, I can help you be aware of it, but I can't fix it. But I think I can fix the budgeting thing. So I'll set you up with my money masterclass and I'll get you on a very good budget and we will do it together and make sure that it is all ready to go so that you've got no excuses. So I can fix one of those bad habits. The other one, like, I'm sorry, do you what, you deserve that bad habit. Let's not call it bad. Let's call it treating ourselves. We're coming to the end of the episode, my love. But at the very start, like we've learned so much about you. You said that you were a B minus maybe. And then you went on to tell me all of this cool

stuff, like what kind of B minus pays off their mortgage or their first mortgage in five years. I just feel like after learning this much about you, your background, what you studied, how much you're you know putting your hat in the ring understanding yeah you do some frugal stuff but like you've just bought your first like home like your dream home with your partner and you're planning on doing $500,000 worth of renovations in cash like girlfriend that's not a B minus like what do you think it would take for you to say to me V I'm an A plus like what type of changes would you need to make to be able to grade yourself there? I think despite earning a lot of money, I do still think I have some room to grow and I think making the most of the money that I

do have coming in. So being more aware of my budget, what my incomings are, what my outgoings are, I really think that that would help me feel more, I guess, aware and conscious of where my money is going. There's a lot of privilege that comes with being in this situation, but I think I'm doing myself a little bit of a disservice by being a bit lazy about it and so that education and also having a bit more of a solid emergency fund like having a nice house isn't going to help me if I run into trouble or lose my job but it's so good to be self-aware of that as well and I just go well you're on the right track like there are so many people who earn heaps of money who just go right well I'm golden I don't have to think about this I have heaps of money coming in

And I just, I think that you're, you're beyond that. Like you're not B minus to me. Maybe an A minus, but I feel like there's always room to grow. So we can sit there for now. My love, this has been so good. I have loved this episode and I just know that there is going to be someone who listens to this and goes, huh, I reckon I could do that and then gets a better job or upgrades their lifestyle or doubles their income because you had a chat with us today.

So I am just really grateful that you wanted to spend the time that you probably don't actually have to hang out with us and share your story for the betterment of our community. So thank you so much for that. I really appreciate it. Thank you so much for having me. I've really, really appreciated being able to share my story. Adore. Thank you so much.

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