The Vault with Financielle - "I’m Earning More Than Ever… So Why Am I Still Broke?" | The Vault Episode 68

Episode Date: June 11, 2025

Send us a text🫢“Being obsessed with cutting costs is a waste of time and energy” 💸 ”I ruin my budget every time I go out”💸 ”I’m earning more than ever… so why am I still broke?”❤️ Ready to protect your future? Visit financielle.com/protection.🐝Thanks to our partner PensionBee. They’re a leading online pension provider on a mission to build pension confidence so that you can enjoy a happy retirement.Pension saving is made simple with PensionBee - you can combine, contribute and withdraw online or from the palm of your hand with their easy-to-use app. Their retirement planning tools - like their Pension Calculator - blogs, videos and podcast - all aim to help you take control of your pension and build a better financial future.When investing, your capital is at risk.Connect with our Partners🐝 Consolidate your pensions with PensionBee (capital at risk)🫶 Protect yourself and loved ones with our friends at Lifesearch✍ Write a will that is tailored to you with Octopus Legacy🏡 Meet our Financielle approved Mortgage Brokers💸 Commission-free investing* with Trading 212 (capital at risk)🛒 Cashback on your shopping with Jam Doughnut (use code FINC)*The above are tracked links, which tells our partners we sent you and may in future result in a payment or benefit to our site.The Vault is an entertaining yet thought provoking podcast that answers our community’s dilemmas and confessions surrounding women and money.Visit https://www.financielle.com to download our app.Watch the podcast on YouTube.Follow Financielle for more:▶︎ TikTok▶︎ InstagramAbout Financielle:Financielle is a female focussed finance app helping women to take back control of their money, ditch debt, increase savings and invest in their future.Recorded and Produced by Liverpool Podcast Studios▶︎ Web ▶︎ Instagram▶︎ LinkedIn

Oh hey, Laura here. I'm just starting off this episode of The Vault to tell you about the money playbook. I used to be terrible with money, designer shoes, fancy meals, all on credit. But everything changed when I realized I needed to take control of my money. That's why I created the money playbook, a step-by-step guide to help you take control of your money, ditch the overwhelm, and create a solid plan for your future self. With three stages, survive, build, and grow, the playbook walks you through everything from paying off debt to building wealth. Start your journey today by grabbing the money playbook for 25% off with the code VAULT.

Check out the link in the podcast description. I promise you won't look back. Now let's get to the episode. Welcome to the vault with Finite Chalk. This is a safe space where we talk all things life and money and no topics are off limits. Hello. I thought you were gonna go in with howdy. It's my favorite welcome greeting from Lucy.

And you nearly said unlocked again. It's like, that's Monday's one. It's so easily done, so easily done. It's nice when I like recording unlocked and saying, so you may have heard with Girls on the Sofa on Thursday. And I feel like I'm interacting with our own pods like talking to myself. Because people will have like heard that

and then heard this one. Yeah, say something to yourself for next Monday. I will, oh my God, I'll ask myself a question, I'll answer it. It's that Diabla CEO vibes. I'm upset about that. Okay, I'm gonna go into today's controversial opinion. Being obsessed with cutting costs

is a waste of time and energy. And I'm talking about obsessing with it every single month, like consistently. That's like, are you the person that when you go out for dinner with a friend, if they've had a starter and you've had a starter, but your starter was two pounds more expensive. If you go out to dinner with my husband, you wouldn't be friends. Like you just wouldn't go out for dinner with each other because he's like, we'll go for the prawns and then I'll have the lamb starter and then I'll have like anything that's could be deemed

expensive and bougie, Neil will order it. And we're splitting it. In abundance, like he's like, we're going all in. So you're the person that if you went out with friends, would be splitting the bill by the penny and you would feel aggrieved possibly if it wasn't split down the middle. You're the person with the receipt to make sure

that you've been charged correctly in a supermarket, which I have never done. And I am sure that in my life, I've been overcharged. Yeah, I'm still. I like the haversed looks. Do you know when we get the bill at a restaurant, Alex is there like. He has the balls to like,

the cord machines there and he's just like. Oh my gosh. I'm just like, just pay, overpay, take it 20%. Yeah. I'm not that person. And I'm like, God forbid something go wrong and you have to say something. Yeah.

I was like, would you actually say something? I feel like if it was as clear as day there, like a bottle of champagne on the menu that I've not had, then maybe. But yeah, this person is probably like, when energy bills are coming out, they're up checking the tariffs, checking the... Is this not savvy though?

Well, it's just whether it becomes obsessive and then not healthy and it doesn't get you anywhere. Whereas I imagine it does get you somewhere. So how would you do it? Like the ultra frugal, ultra frugal living. But if you don't need to do that, is it a good obsession? Listen, and if you don't enjoy doing that kind of thing, it's a full-time job.

Like it is hard, you know, I feel for all those people that carry the budget, that like do the switches and do the hard work, find the discounts, get the cash back app sorted, have used this, have used that, because it is exhausting. And sometimes it does come, you know, we've talked about this on other podcasts, from a place of need. Like it's a very privileged thing to be like, well, we'll just split the bill.

I am that person, but, but, oh no, I'm a splitter of the bill, but I am very about the just. I will be like, who had, I had steak and a red wine. You did not. You are driving and you're having a salad. So I'm putting more in. I'm good at saying, well, Holly doesn't drink, so she doesn't have, you know.

And I'm like, no, it's usually, I'll just be like, all right, it's fine. But then sometimes if it's been a bit, we've gone to a nice restaurant, there's lots of bottles of wine being drunk. And I'm just like, I've literally had sparkling water. It's a pound. Like you might feel a little bit,

if you can't just about money, like you said, it's coming from a privilege. I can, I could forego it and say, oh, it's a pound. Like you might feel a little bit, if you're conscious about money, like you said, it's coming from a privilege. I could forego it and say, oh, it's fine. Don't worry about it. And I have done before. But yeah, just for the ease, not for any other reason. But yeah, but then on the flip side, people that are totally careless,

like don't take any notice of what's happening to the money. Don't try and be savvy in any sort of way when it comes to bills, interest rates, whatever it might be, will actually be losing out on a hell of a lot of money. So I think there's two extremes to it. I just got an image of like Chloe's Deal Club.

And if you, she's doing the work for you. Like if you sign up to her newsletter, she's got a couple of tears I think, but she will do the work and find the discounts and the deals. And she's very big on only buying stuff if you need it, but she's done the hustle because it is hard work trying to navigate.

It's this time of year, I need to buy this. Gifts is a big one at Christmas. Like, if you're trying to get things, or you want that big purchase on Black Friday. Yeah, she does the deals stacking. It's exhausting. I could never. She does probably a place of privilege for some people, but I think

she's got a family member in Australia and she does a really good rundown of how to get cheaper business class tickets. Oh wow. And that does save people thousands like go and look at her newsletter like Laura said, if not just DM us and we'll send it to you because it's incredible. But she's put the work in it's like I'm talking pages and pages of how to go about it, but that saved her and her family because a few of them went thousands and thousands of pounds.

So it does pay to be that person and that savvy. Sometimes it can be to your detriment where you then feel ill if something, you've been relying on a deal to like come off and it's not worked like a full stretch. No, it just came to mind. Emma mattresses. All right, yeah.

There's always a sale and it's always ending in 10 minutes. Every day, if you ever want to buy a mattress, it's always ending and it's always the foam, not FOMO, but like, at now, you'll never get this deal again until this time tomorrow. Tomorrow or another influencer comes on with this one time offer, you're like, that's funny. Or there's always that shop that's closing down.

Yeah, wonder if anyone's bought a's always that shop that's closing down. Yeah. Wonder if anyone's bought a full price. For the last 12 years. Well, I have, so I have MyProtein protein. And so I got some gym kit from MyProtein and used Zoe Ray's code. So she got like tick and I got extra money off. And they are absolutely breaching GDPR

because I unsubscribe every day. I've not been put out of it, but I can't be bothered going fine in the email where you tell them, please can you unsubscribe me? And the reason I want them to unsubscribe me is I don't want the deals because I don't want to be convinced to buy because I'm all right. I've got some gym kit, if I want protein,

I go and try and find discounts if I can. But I've got the app and the app pop-ups are coming up and they're constantly peppering you with deals, but it does make a big difference when you can get a big chunk off. And so monitoring that and making sure that you, for the brands that you like, sign up to some newsletters, watch out for deals, prepare for them, but then don't spend when you don't need to spend. You can have a leg in each camp.

You can be a little savvy and it not be the absolute beyond end all. But I do think you've just got people that are good at it and people that aren't. Yeah, I'm not. And I'm not, no, no, absolutely not. But when I need to be, I probably am. Like you said, if I was gonna buy a gym kit from, Gymshark, I've batted with it as well.

MyProtein, I think I looked at a top once and then now I'm suddenly like in the, I might as well be around the board table because I know everything about the company. I'm getting all the emails, all the discounts, all the product updates, like I should work in the merchandiser team. I know how many stocks left of this particular thing.

That feels very intense. So you have to protect yourself. If you're tempted by spending with stuff like that, you can get sucked into the deal thing. Like we went around to Neil's parents in the day And we're all Yorkshire tea drinkers like we love it and our food truck wasn't coming the day after we've already borrowed some tea bags from Laura we then went to Magical mystery talk I think even my mum brought some tea bags the day before that. This is this savvy a magical mystery talk, I think even my mum brought some tea bags the day before that.

This is the savvy, they've not bought any in years. It's just like once a month they can borrow some tea bags. Neil's dad was like, oh look, and he put a brand new box down. He was like, oh, it's from Dragon's Deals or something. And Neil was like, oh, amazing. Like, and there were 80 tea bags in it. He was like, how much did you pay for that?

He was like, three pound 40 now. Neil was like, you have been robbed. He was like, I have got a box of tea bags coming tomorrow from Asda after I've utilized yours, thank you. 240 bags for five pounds something. He was like, so you think you're getting a good deal? Just because you got it from someone called Dragon's Deals. Dragon's Deals.

I'm a sucker for a sticker or a sale thing. He was really happy with himself as well. He was like, look, and Neil's like, how much then? And Neil just like, whey, you've been hard. When I was talking about deals the other day and I, it was, I got a, I'm not the cook in our house. So it was a piece of beef fillet, like a massive thing, insane.

And I saw a yellow stick and I was like, oh, I wonder like, just out of curiosity. And it should have been like 26 pounds and it was nine. So I got it. I was so thrilled with myself. But then I was like, do I need it? I'm not going to cook it. So I panicked because it was such a big saving. I picked it up, put it in the basket, sent Neil a picture when I was halfway round.

Because I didn't want to look like so uncool and like take the picture and go, should I get this or have have to fight then someone left. Cause if you'd have left it, someone else could have swooped in. I put it in the basket, did a bit more shopping and then took a picture of it and was like, could we put this to use? And he was like, a hundred percent yes, get it. But imagine if he was like, it's not worth mine.

What the hell is this? We're making a beef Wellington in the middle of summer. We don't even like that one. What do you want me to do with it? I thought it was going to be like, what do you want me to make with that? And he was like going to be like, what do you want me to make with that? And he was like, get it. I don't know what things cost.

I'm definitely not savvy. I am. We recently got some windows replaced and my husband's the detail person and was very passionate about getting new windows. I was just like, really like, literally not bothered at all, especially because we would only get like for like, like we weren't doing a nice aesthetic upgrade. It just, they hadn't been replaced. We'd had some renos in the other bits of the house and they had been. And so, well actually he'd talked about it. And then I walked in on

my husband with another man who was quoting us windows. So I came in, I think I came in from the pod actually. I went, hi. he's like, hi, this is Dave. Luckily Dave had a clipboard and that was about it. There was nothing else to worry about. But he was like, oh, you know what? He said, oh, he was just quoting us windows. I was like, oh, Fab, I was like, have you got any other quotes? He was like, oh yeah, he was number eight.

Oh my God. Carl, sorry, not my husband. But lots of like, stuffy. He's so due diligent. Yeah. So we then had a quote from the same people and Neil is like, the guy was trying to sell it to him and Neil is like, don't worry,

you don't have to sell it to me. My brother-in-law's definitely done the due diligence. Like, and we won't be going and getting other quotes because Carl's probably got 10 others and you were the chosen one. So just, you'll be fine. Like we won't be, you don't need to upsell. Yeah, you're already the cheapest upsell or convince us that you

would be the cheapest and like best quality because he's not just about price but yeah you're good. Yeah yeah you're good like you're in the club because Carl's got you. I would have paid double and gone okay is that what they cost like I'm not I'm not savvy like that I'm proud I'm not proud like I would rather be better but not. But if you don't have to be because someone else in your family is and that's the role that we take. Thank God.

He does the work. Amen. Okay, first dilemma. Okay, listeners, you know that here at Financial, we hold your hands through your money journey, navigating life's ups and downs. It's rare that a money journey is linear. Big life events like babies, death or getting divorced can have huge

implications on your financial health. But at what cost? Luckily our friends at Pension B have the answers. Their Pension Confident podcast explores all of these topics and more. Each episode dives into a key personal finance question from what's the real cost of divorce to can you afford to have kids? The Pension Confident podcast is available right now wherever you usually get your podcasts. And remember when investing your capital is at risk. I ruin my budget every time I go out. Any tips on how to stick to a budget when going on a night out? I don't go out often but when I do I'm so bad for buying other people drinks and losing track of my spending when drinking.

I wake up in the morning and feel so frustrated with myself if I've overspent and it puts me off going out. Any advice would be fab. Seeing this. Yeah. It's like, you actually need to do the work on yourself. I'm gonna be totally honest with you. This actually isn't a money problem.

It's a, I think personally, a self-esteem problem. Confidence. Where you feel like in order to fit in with your group, you've created a personality where you're the like, fun, outgoing, kind, generous, and you probably are all of those things, but when you pour alcohol, it's like fuel to the flame,

like, and it can just get carried away. And I know people that do this where they're like, let's get a bottle of champagne, I'll get the drinks. Like everyone's best friend. But it's still a truth, you can be everyone's best friend. You can still be the personality higher in the group of friends. You don't have to lose out financially.

And I think a really good way of doing this is getting something like, personally, I use styling and I've got a personal account and I've got a joint one with my husband. You can only have so much money in space at any one time, like as in you could move money over. So say, give yourself a budget for the night out. Say it's a hundred pounds.

I don't know how much it is to go out because I go out free. I don't drink, so I don't know. Say you're going out on a night out in Manchester and you want to give yourself a hundred pound budget. Put it in, don't take. Say you're going out a night out in Manchester and you wanna give yourself a hundred pound budget, put it in, don't take any other cards out. You could even disable some of your cards as well on your phone, like take away the Apple Pay, then you've not getting the tap happy

and you've just got that to spend and you put it in a space and that's all you can spend. Try cash, no, it takes cash. It's really hard, cause once you, like if you have had a bit to drink, your willpower changes, and if that's your routine, you can be all well-intentioned about, I'm not going to do it. And it is really hard. And I think it's maybe trying a couple of nights out where you don't drink as well.

There's no judgment. Like I drink, Holly doesn't drink. Like it's each to their own. Sometimes I'm with the driver and it's great for the head the next day, great for the gym, great for the calories and great for the bank balance because it can really, really stack up. And so I think if every time you drink and every time you buy drinks, try and test yourself with a couple of nights out where you're the driver, you're still the fun, you're still going to enjoy yourself. But I think you're going to have that. If you do this every time you need one where you don't and you need one without the guilt and without the, so I just fancy that having a little go at being out, being social, but social on a budget. And when you're not drinking, it's so much more easy to be savvier with your money.

When you've had a drink, you just slip into bad habits and you're just in rounds or there's loads of different ways that you can slip up a little bit. Watch how they drink without you there. You're not gonna not drink. Like you're filling, they might well be on the way to the bar to go and get a drink and you're like, no, let me get it.

Like watch the dynamics. Like they're still gonna, if they like to have a drink, they're still gonna go and do it. How are they gonna pay for it? With the raw money that they've got, like you don't have to be that person. I do think it's an ego like personality. We're gonna bring it out.

It's the main character moment. You are thinking they think that that's your role. In the friendship group. That you, and what if she doesn't, what if she doesn't buy us all drinks? They've literally, they're probably fed up of you buying drinks because they might feel guilty because they're not.

So then, you know, like, yeah. Sometimes it backf, I do sometimes feel like that. It actually sometimes makes me feel a bit awkward when people overly go like, no, I'll pay for it. I'll do this. You're like, no, I can pay for it. And then you end up feeling like, do they think that I want them to do that?

Or I've let them do it a couple of times. They have to keep up the persona. Adds a layer of pressure on everyone else. The other person might not want you to do that. And don't get me wrong, there will be some people, and I've seen it before growing up, they do take advantage of people. They do take advantage of people.

Oh, they'll never put their hands in their pocket, but they'll wait for the rounds to be bought. You know, and that will happen. But there's nothing wrong with spending money on nights out, on spending money on nice food, on outfits for it, on taxes. It needs to form part of your overall budget. And you're obviously not happy with the amount that you're spending and you feel guilty about it afterwards or you feel annoyed with yourself.

And so you need to make sure that you've got a budget that works for your night out budget works for the whole budget. So it's not too much. it's not dipping into other areas. Because if you do that, you'll feel better about yourself because you won't feel like you've compromised it. But yeah, test out your role. Play a different character. Like don't that-

Be a side character for the night. Be a side. If you can manage it. Oh my God, that was an extra. An extra. Be brave about that not being your role. Take on a different role. Take on a, I'm gonna be An extra. An extra. An extra. Be brave about that not being your role. Take on a different role. Take on a, I'm gonna be the listener tonight.

I'm gonna see if everyone's okay. I'm gonna, I don't know, I'll be the driver. I'm gonna give people a lift. Like, just take on a role and just test it out. And what you'll realize, I think, is that they still all love you the same and actually they didn't even realize. Yeah, I think as well,

if you do wanna go out and have a night out and you still wanna drink, maybe at the beginning of the night being like, oh guys, watch me tonight, have my back. Because you know what I'm like, I want to buy everyone drinks, but I'm trying to like save for a holiday, save for a house deposit.

I'm trying to pay off my credit card. I really don't want to buy my overdraft anymore. And if you've got good friends, they'll be like, put your hand in, like stop. If we said that to our friends, they would all hold you accountable. They'd be like, Holly, don't be putting your hands in your pocket, you said.

Like pay your way. Like you're not saying, oh, pay for me. You're just saying, don't let me be the, we're buying everyone shots at the bar. Like we have got a mutual friend that actually does that quite a lot. And it's put him into debt and he watches the pod as well. So he'll be feeling seen right now, but he does it.

He does it and he doesn't need to. And his best friend told us- Everyone loves him already. Everyone loves him. He's like, he is the main character. He doesn't need to buy own drinks. He's a good crack, but he's, and he'll admit it himself when he's had a drink,

he's on the tables, he's buying the shots. Mr. Party. He's getting the rounds in, yeah. And only to his own drinks. But he could still be Mr. Party without funding everyone else's party. Yeah. It makes me think of that story that he told about Cole.

Was he in Ibiza or something? Yeah, the vodka one. He was the party then. He paid for the party, he didn't realize it was a party. I can't remember what episode it was, guys, but long story short, one of his friends took his card and bought a two grand or one grand bottle of rubbish in Ibiza and he rang

the police thinking he'd been defrauded. And they were like, were you in this bar at this time? And they were like, yes, I was. It got soft to the end, but it just shows like a lot. So many regrets after a night out for spending. I mean, we saw, this is going back a few weeks now, but did you see for Coachella, 75% of the tickets were bought on Buy Now Pay Later. They know it, they know it. 75% of the number of tickets. They're so expensive, they're like thousands. And then you get there, you get there,

and the drinks price is like, it's just, Ibiza looks like a Benidorm. Yeah. Oh really? It's so expensive, like $50 for a cocktail. Oh for God's sake. And then you've got to pay for your villa in Palm Springs. Yeah. Cause you need to stay there.

We're talking like water was like $20. I've seen people sleeping in cars. I saw people like literally sleeping in normal cars cause it was just so expensive to stay. They were like, I'll sleep in the car. And it wasn't like a, I don't know, like a camper van. It was literally like a Ford Fiesta or whatever the equivalent is. And the outfits and the, I would,

do you know, it's going back, so we'll have to see if we can dig, but the- Breakdown of that- The regrets, the paying off last year's Coachella this year is just crazy, but yeah, there's, we can all, like, so if you've had a little bit to drink at an event or a club or a holiday where the drinks were already expensive, the next day you look at that credit card. How many people have been to, what is it, like, O?

O Beach. Ocean Beach. Ocean Beach and they're just living in regrets. Yes. Yeah, because it was the moment. It's a bravado. I imagine it happens to men a lot more. Yeah, sparklers.

Yeah, it's like an like some parents are now. It's like a ego booster. And then literally living it. Or you're going away with friends that have got a lot more money than you and it's your turn. It's your round. I remember when we were younger,

they used to, we moved in a circle that we're still moving it. But we couldn't afford to be in it. Like I was a student and Neil, I don't even know what Neil was doing at the time. Not bringing in the same amount of money as our peers basically. And they used to do like credit card roulette

where they'd all go out for dinner and then they'd throw all the credit cards in. And our friends used to be like, you are not participating in this game. Like they are good friends. But some people don't have the luck that we have and wouldn't recognize that that is way beyond something that someone should be doing.

And it's just a game. Credit card roulette? Like 12 people- Debit card roulette. Like, you don't need a credit card. But like, I'm talking like- Oh my God, that's just giving me anxiety about thinking about-

Meal of 12 people, alcohol, starters, mains, prawns, steak, prawns. Oh God. Not the prawns, but listen to that. I never had prawns, I'm a cheap date. They're very expensive. That was a good one. I enjoyed that chat. Only because you're sat at home.

That would never be me. You're doing gales. What's up to everyone? Enjoying your mortgage, enjoying your rent, getting your money's worth, getting your pajamas. Let us know what you do, but I do feel like Holly said, unfortunately, I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that.

I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that. I'm going to be able to do that. What's for everyone? No, enjoying your mortgage, enjoying your rent, getting your money's worth, getting your pajamas. No, let us know what you do.

But I do feel like, like Holly said, unfortunately, this is, well, it's fortunately as well, but this is work on you. Yeah. You need to work on you. You are the problem. You're the problem and solution. Yeah. Yep.

Ooh, I like that. Quote, Laura, 2025. Okay, community win time. I just want to say thank you to Finite Child. I've had life insurance on my to-do list for six years, and I've finally got it sorted. Yes! Oh my god. I cannot tell you, I never thought in my life I'd talk about life insurance.

And I never thought I'd talk about it so passionately as I do now, but I like a light bulb moment went off when we started talking about it at financial and recognizing that none of us probably protected in any way, I feel like it skips generations of people. Like this knowledge around life insurance, it just used to be a thing that you go to like a wealth advisor for, or there'd be like a salesman with a briefcase,

like, no, you don't need to do that. You need to go to financial.com forward slash protection, and we will look after you. Yeah, because what used to happen was, well, most of us wouldn't have gone to financial advisors, but buying homes, that was the point where banks require it. It's really hilarious, because for a bank to require it, suggests it's quite important.

But because lots of us aren't buying homes, we're not getting that meeting, that chat where, oh, you know that nice aesthetic kitchen that you want to make? You can't do that until you've signed this form and bought some life insurance. Okay. And even then, and I reflected on this actually a few weeks ago and changed my cover because they were born out of times when it was just covering a mortgage at first and then there were less children and assets were less. And, you know, having someone,

so I don't like speaking to people normally. I'm like, I'm a WhatsApp-er. I don't need a phone call if I don't have to have a phone call. It depends. I think for life I've been stuff. I just like getting things sorted quickly. It really annoys me that I can't do something efficiently. But on this one, I wanted to chat to someone

because I was kind of wanting to talk through the wider picture. What my worries were, what my stresses were, what our emergency fund was, what we both did for work, and looking at it all together. And it's just game changing. And once you've done it once, you've then nailed it again for another five, 10 years,

and then you might revisit it again. And I do think there's a lost generation that have fallen between the gaps of going through the formal mortgage process and how are people getting protected properly? And the messages that we've had from people going, you've made it not overwhelming, not think about me dying,

not thinking about all the morbid stuff, just thinking about like- It's more like from a wellbeing perspective, what would happen if I'm not here or my partner's not here? How will we cope financially? It's not something you wanna think about. And by all means, we can give you a really good framework

so that you are financially well, but we can't stop someone from passing away. No, and basically maths doesn't work then as well. So like you can only in extreme scenarios can you have saved enough to cope with that scenario or have your expenses solo like most households now need to earn it's like what we know our solo homeowners are just absolutely killing it because they're having to juggle all of this on their own. And so all the budget in the world cannot

help really when something catastrophic happens. And so it's like the travel insurance one, it's insurance that you hope you never have to use. You just have it there, but the peace of mind it can bring. And actually the income protection one's super interesting because I've been speaking to people in our community who've managed to reduce their emergency fund. They've been able to dump it into investments,

they've been able to put it into house deposit because they've been able to cover that emergency, especially our self-employed members, with a little bit of insurance that isn't just that expensive. So, no, it has been one of the left field things that we covered. I never, I said never thought I would talk about it.

I understand. Land insurance ambassador. Not the ideal. Yeah. But I think if I'm talking about it, you should be talking about it as well. But we work with a company whereby you can, if you want to as well,

if you don't feel comfortable speaking to a male about this, if you feel like it's something quite personal, you wanna speak to a female advisor, we can sort that for you as well. So like I said, go to financial.com forward slash protection. You've got two options there. You can either do it online yourself or you can request speak to a female advisor,

which I quite like, it's a little bit different. I've never known any other people do that. Yeah, my advisor was female, but like the idea that sometimes you're talking about health issues, you know, especially doing critical illness cover, you might have been through a particular breakup. There might be sensitivities. You might have come out of a,

you might have lost someone and you're protecting yourself. And there's just something where you want to feel not sold to and you want to feel comfortable. And I love that they said, oh, if people ask, they can speak to whoever they want. Like, do you want a female? We'll reserve the females. I'm like, yep, we will take that. So yeah, I love, I love that whim. Not always like, it's not always a financial win. It's

sometimes like a tick, a life admin tick. After six years. Yeah. Yeah. Oh my God. That's like, I mean, I've had things on my list. The procrastinator in me is empathizing with this like, oh, it didn't take me that long. Like, I don't know about you, but I do that all the time where I'm like, oh, put it off, put it off, put it off. Done. Oh, that was it.

Okay, time for our next dilemma. Just a quick one, Laura here. If you're wanting to take back control of your money, ditch debt, make better decisions, and build wealth for the future, the Financial app is for you. With Financial you can track your spending on the go, hit your money goals faster and create a realistic budget that you can actually stick to. Not to mention you'll be part of an exclusive money community who share tips, offer support and celebrate your successes along the way.

Click the link in the description to download Financial and start your free trial now. This is your sign to take control of your money today. Okay, I'm done. Let's go back to the vault. I'm earning more than ever, so why am I still broke? I recently got a big salary bump at work. I'm now earning 80k, which feels surreal to say. I'm a single girl living in London with my best friend and honestly life is full on, but fun.

I thought this raise would finally be the thing that sorted my money out. I assumed I'd feel secure, maybe even start saving properly. But nope, somehow I feel just as broke as before. I'm spending more 100%, Ubers instead of the tube, after work drinks that turn into dinners, Nope, somehow I feel just as broke as before. I'm spending more 100%, Ubers instead of the tube, after work drinks that turn into dinners,

little weekend trips here and there. I don't even feel like I'm going wild, but at the end of the month, I've basically got nothing left. I'm embarrassed to admit that I don't even have an emergency fund. Even though my income looks amazing on paper, I still feel anxious when I'm opening my bank account.

I think I'm dealing with the lifestyle creep, but part of me feels like I've worked so hard I should be able to enjoy it. Any advice on balancing how to enjoy a good salary without falling victim to the lifestyle creep? I pictured aesthetic lifestyle. When you said single girly living in London. She's going to Blank Street.

Going to see friends. She's yeah, she's doing reform blank screen. Going to see friends. She's doing Reforma. Blank Street, Gales. I can see her because I see her on my Instagram and my TikTok all the time. And I don't think there's ever been a tougher time to be in your early 20s and be influenced. She could be older, but from that up, oh my God. We did not have, I mean, we were like early days Kardashians, like that was our level of influence and because they were so wealthy, that it was such a big disparity. I can't comprehend, I did reform of Pilates

the other day. I wasn't very good at it. I don't know. So I was good at it, right? And I've given the Pilates girls some flack on here before because I think if it wasn't on TikTok and if you didn't wear nice outfits, people wouldn't do it. It's a beautiful room, it's well lit, there's gorgeous people. I think that's what we're all drawn to.

It was a really good workout, but I was really worried I was gonna fall into the reformer. So if anyone's done it before, you might know what I mean, where if you are doing quite a hard one, and I was trying to do, because I've been getting stronger and stronger on my legs, I wanted to do the, what they're called? Like the intense one.

The intense one, like the variations. And then you start shaking and stuff. And usually if you're doing a Bulgarian split squat off the bench, you just put your foot down on the reformer, you can't do that, you're high. And the old person in me is like, whoa. And so I went and I was actually gifted it from a friend because he had vouchers and there's a few of us went

and used it. And I don't know if I, I mean, I think some of these sessions like 27 quid, it's not a chance of. And that's like Northern prices, I would say in London. You price up like a Saturday in London for someone who is living that kind of lifestyle between that and the brunch and the matcha and what you're wearing and then your skincare and then you're going to go out for lunch, then you're going to go out dinner. If you do all that stuff, we couldn't have afforded it.

And we didn't. We really, really didn't. It wasn't in our budgets. This isn't the like the boomers doing the, you almost stopped having your avocado on toast. It's so hard nowadays though, to not feel that that's normal. That isn't normal. I'm gonna say it, it is not normal to have to spend all that.

And so we see time and time again, these pay rises don't matter if you've not sorted your budget out because you can be earning six figures and still have this problem where actually, it's a privileged thing to say, but the more you earn, it doesn't, you can still give it more in tax and you still luckily put more into your pension,

but it's not that much more. And all it takes is a few hundred quid here and there, treating yourself because you worked hard. Which you have, no one's saying you haven't. You know, like when people say treat yourself and they're like, they'll find, they can convince ourselves of anything. But which bits the treat,

because is the Pilates the treat or is that routine? Is that my fitness class? She didn't even mention Pilates and I've just decided that's what she's doing. No, but I think she definitely did. You just giving, it's giving the that. The lifestyle creep means that you're spending, your income is like, it's not matching, is it?

Like it's inflated, so therefore your expenses inflate. You go, oh, I'm making more money, therefore I'll spend more money. The budget is the core of this. Like no matter how much money you have coming in, whether you get paid 30 grand, 100K, 80K, everyone should have a budget. And you have sinking funds

and you decide what those sinking funds are for and the math is math and gore isn't and in your case it isn't. The fact that you've got no emergency savings on an 80K salary, someone with a 20K income probably has emergency funds in our community because they've followed the methodology. And the idea that you feel stressed about payday.

Like that's telling you that's not, that's not treating yourself. That's not looking after yourself actually. You said at the end, I just, I want to enjoy myself or something. Right in this dilemma, you're not treating yourself. That's not looking after yourself actually. You said at the end, I just, I want to enjoy myself or something. Right in this dilemma, you're not enjoying yourself. I enjoy myself. You get paid more than me.

I'll tell you, I'll be transparent. This person gets paid a lot more than me, but I'm probably in a financially better position in that I've got emergency savings and I have sinking funds and I sit down at the beginning of every month and I decide where I want my joy to be and it can't be everywhere. I have to make choices.

And you can switch it up and one month it could be there's a trip and another month it could be I'm gonna get abuse treatment done. Like it can change around. We're gonna day out, we're gonna go for really nice food. It sounds like she's not got a goal. Cause like if you're just living in the moment and enjoying yourself, you kind of get carried away

and it is a bit like monopoly money, especially when you have more, when you get paid more. And I've been paid lots of different things. And when you get paid a salary like that, what happens is, oh, that's sad. Cause she says, oh, she says, not on payday, but on payday, so much money goes in that you go, huh? And because you've kind of got more than you had, because now you've got a raise, you're

less likely to budget. So what happens is it's just sloshing around in there. So bills start to go out and it all adds up. And then suddenly it's gone. And it's because you're not able to divide it all up. And that's why doing a budget, moving money into pots, either sinking from pots, like your flexible expenses, dividing it up and even dividing it on a weekly basis. I've seen people do this really well where you do food and fun week one, food and fun week two, because what it means is you don't

spend everything in week one and two. That's a good idea. And like Holly said, choose what your thing is. Because I think what you'll realize is you're normalizing treats. So you're normalizing probably, again, I'm just picking up what the aesthetic is, but work, athleisure outfits, doing a haul at the shops, we're going to Zara, nice dinners out in aesthetic locations, skincare that's not just like simple moisturizer and face wipes. That's what we survived on. Like we didn't have all this really expensive layered approach to beauty.

In your early 20s, that adds up. And so start with the end in mind, watch your goal, make sure that fits into your budget. And if your goal, let's say she wants to save an emergency fund, that's where she'd be. She's pointed out, I've not even got an emergency fund. So I'd go, okay. What's one month's expenses.

And so if she's on 18, it depends what expenses are, but let's pretend it's like three, three, four grand net. Let's pretend she needs to save that. So she needs to decide how quickly do I wanna save that? Can she save 1,000, 1,500 a month? Because if she can, put that, make sure that's left over in your budget in the app and work backwards.

And if, you know, you might not be able to do some of the things that you're doing, but it's for a period of time. Yeah, it is, That's what it is. But then those good behaviors, you'll keep them going because it'll be too addictive to see an excess and to go back to not having an excess will make you feel ill. Because you'll be like, I have all this money and I've got all this opportunity. Like, do you know when people do a food shop when they're like,

why I did my food shop and I have my healthy head on? And then you go and you just wanna buy all the rubbish. But that's what you, that's a little bit of what you need to do, you need to do a budget at the beginning of the month when you've got all that money and all that opportunity and put it away and give it a job. And yeah, by week three, you might be like, oh, I just wanna have my nails done

and I wanna have a blank street and I wanna go to Reforma cause I can. You've already put the money away, everything's got a job so you're less tempted to stray. So like, you have to do the budget., everything's got a job, so you're less tempted to stray. So like, you have to do the budget. Like, there's no other option for you, sorry, if you want to feel financially well. And you know, you are in a, she doesn't mention debt,

she may well have debt, but she's definitely not got an emergency savings. So you are not financially well right now. You shouldn't be treating yourself because you're feeling worse for it. You will feel better about those treats and that lifestyle if you've got emergency savings. And it's just flexing that muscle. It's like starting that process. Like you've not started the process yet, start that process. And I feel like, I think you're quite good at this Lucy,

but like romanticizing the small things and you can still have a tight budget and have fun things in it, I think you're quite good at this Lucy, but like romanticizing the small things and you can still have a tight budget and have fun things in it, can't you? Yeah, you can make like a basic, I think, do you know how we say like, oh, model it like what's your like basic budget? What's like a bougie budget? I think, okay, what's the basic,

most basic lifestyle that you want, that you can live? And maybe it's like, okay, you get one coffee a week and you don't get it to take away. You go and get it on a Saturday morning. You take your book, you take your journal and like you really enjoy that, like five pounds that you spend. Yeah.

Yeah. And like. Getting money's worth. Yeah. Not walking down the street, drinking the coffee whilst doing 20 other things. On your phone. Yeah.

Just being so present and yeah, literally enjoying every single little thing. And also, and this, so you can on your phone. Yeah, just being so present and yeah, literally enjoying every single little thing. And also, and this, so you can do your budget. So do an accurate budget, which is what you're spending now. This is your task and you do it. And then you do another one where you squeeze that. And so things like you will look back and you have to look back and see what you actually spent.

Cause you'll say, oh, I spend this on going out. Going out is expensive. We are not judging you for how much it costs. It's not your fault how much it costs. Let's say you've actually spent six, oh, I spend this on going out. Going out is expensive. We are not judging you for how much it costs. It's not your fault how much it costs. Let's say you've actually spent six, seven, 800 pound. That is easily done for someone, especially in a city. Make that, I mean, half in it changes your life. But then pick what could you switch out for.

So for example, we've talked about alcohol in this podcast, even doing an alcohol-free night out, massively reduces the bill, going to somewhere that you can walk to, not getting the Ubers, like every tube you get in, bank that money. It's about habit and slipping into bad habits. But go through every line of your budget and go,

okay, for a period of time, what can I cut back? And just try it out. If you cut too much, pull it back a bit, that's fine. You can give yourself a little bit more, but I think you'll be surprised. Don't do finger in air. Like, oh, I think I spend 500 pounds on groceries. You probably don't.

It's really expensive. You live on your own, it might be cheaper than that. But don't do a finger in air job. Do an autopsy. And I mean an autopsy on your last month's budget and be honest with yourself. Categorize it and just be honest with yourself. Create that budget and go,

okay, it's literally minus 300 pounds. That's what I did last month. Okay, what can I do next month? You might break even the next month and then the next month you might save a hundred and then you'll just get into a routine and start to squeeze. The good thing with you is you've got opportunity. You have 80 grand salary, you have all the opportunity in the world. Like you are in a really good position to really be good with money. And I think that's really exciting. And if for saving your emergency fund, I think once you've done a budget,

looking at a no-spend challenge could be really good for you because you can tell your friends, you can be like, guys, I need some savings. I've not got any. So I am walking everywhere. I wanna do things local. I'm gonna get the tube. We're not got any. So I am walking everywhere. I want to do things local. I'm going to get the tube. We're not getting delivery. Look, the good thing about no spend challenges

is you do do the autopsy and you look at your weak points. So for example, like if Amazon is your weak point, you literally delete the app. You unconnect your bank, your bank things. If the takeaway apps are, you delete that. If you are getting peppered with advertisements from ASOS or from Zara or from whoever, you unsubscribe. You do the things. Cause if you really need something and if you really want it, you'll find your way to it, but at the moment help cut distractions. And this is strategy over willpower because we're all human.

Build a strategy that gets you to that mini emergency fund level. And I just think you'll absolutely, it'll change your life. Yeah. I love strategy over willpower. Yeah. Well, listen, we're all human and who has willpower? I had four pretzels on this. I had four pretzels before coming onto this podcast. And it's because they're on the desk out there and the lid was off.

So the strategy is they need to move it out of sight. And if I sat on that desk, so it was moved because I don't have willpower. That if I walk past it, I'll get two more. and I don't know what they are on my fitness pal because I didn't buy them it's a strategy of willpower every time. That's all for this episode the vault is now locked and just a quick disclaimer the vault is just a chat around life and money topics we're not giving financial advice.