0:00

Hello, my name is

0:02

Natasha Nabananga-Bamblet. I'm a proud

0:04

Yorta Yorta, Kurnai, Whelpri and O'Wagery woman

0:07

and before we get started on She's

0:09

On The Money podcast I would like

0:11

to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the

0:14

land of which this podcast is recorded

0:16

on a Wandry country, acknowledging

0:18

the elders, the ancestors and the

0:20

next generation coming through as

0:23

this podcast is about connecting, empowering,

0:26

knowledge sharing and the storytelling of you

0:28

to make a difference for today and

0:31

lasting impact for tomorrow. Let's

0:33

get into it. She's on the

0:35

money. She's on the money. Hello

0:58

and welcome to She's On The Money,

1:00

the podcast for millennials who want financial

1:02

freedom. Welcome back to another one of

1:04

our money diaries where I get the

1:06

absolute pleasure of sitting down with one

1:08

of our She's On The Money community

1:10

members to talk all about their journey.

1:12

Let's jump straight into it because this

1:14

week I got a message and it

1:17

sounded like this. Hi

1:19

V, I have a pretty unique career

1:21

in a male-dominated industry and live an

1:23

island life in a very remote part

1:25

of Australia. I have a

1:28

lot to say about the inflated cost of

1:30

living due to my location but I've worked

1:32

my way up and negotiated a $40,000 pay

1:35

rise in the last six months. I'd

1:37

love to share my less than average lifestyle

1:39

with the community. Same, welcome to

1:42

the show. Thank you so much for having

1:44

me. Wow, you make my life sound pretty

1:46

interesting. You wrote that. Oh no,

1:48

Anna-Lisa, our producer wrote that. So I told you

1:51

she was a good egg. Before we were recording

1:53

I was talking about how great she is but

1:55

that is it though, like where is the lie

1:57

my friend? Yeah it's true that

1:59

is... my life at the moment. I'm so

2:01

excited to learn more about it. Before

2:04

we get there, could you give us a little bit

2:06

of an idea? What grade would

2:08

you give your money habits from A through to F if

2:10

I asked you to grade them? Yeah,

2:12

so I was thinking a B plus,

2:14

I think, would come up with money habits

2:16

at the moment. Well, let's learn more about

2:18

it. You said you have an island life

2:21

in a very remote part of Australia, and

2:23

I want to know more about your money

2:25

story. So tell me where you come from

2:27

and now why you're on an island. Yeah,

2:29

so I live in a really remote island

2:31

in the north of Australia, which is about

2:33

as north as you can get, actually. It

2:36

is a beautiful lifestyle. You know, it's a

2:38

very slow lifestyle. And I've managed to fall

2:41

into a career up here that I never

2:43

thought I'd fall into, but it's going very

2:45

well. And I'm really enjoying it. I'm feeling

2:47

very blessed to have this job. So yeah,

2:49

island life is absolutely incredible, but it doesn't

2:51

come without its difficulties. You

2:53

know, cost of living up here is

2:56

definitely felt a little bit more just

2:59

because they're so remote and things are

3:01

shipped in from very far away. How did you

3:03

grow up around money? I

3:06

was raised in a single parent family. So there

3:08

was definitely never a lot of

3:10

money while I was growing up. But

3:12

in saying that, my mum is incredible.

3:14

She's always managed to provide everything that

3:16

myself and my brother needed. So

3:18

I definitely learned a lot of my money

3:21

habits from her. She was a great saver

3:23

and instilled those beliefs around money and me

3:25

and my brother. So after

3:27

school, I went to university and I lived

3:29

the university life, which is never a very

3:32

wealthy life. I was living at a home

3:34

in Melbourne and working to support

3:36

myself through that. And after

3:38

graduating uni, I kind of thought,

3:40

well, an office job isn't for me. So

3:44

I fled Melbourne and I came to

3:46

Queensland and I've been working on boats

3:48

ever since. On boats? That's

3:50

interesting. I love this. So tell me a

3:53

bit more about the decision to go, you

3:55

know, I don't want to live an

3:58

office job. I want something else. going,

4:00

you know what is for me about?

4:02

Like how did you go from you

4:05

know making that decision from being in

4:07

uni, which is relatively structured let's be

4:09

honest, to having obviously a much quieter

4:11

life but also working in that space?

4:14

Yes I was actually working hospitality when

4:16

I was in university and when

4:19

it came towards my graduation I was like

4:21

you know I didn't see myself going straight

4:23

into an office role so I thought well

4:25

I'm going to go work in a hospitality

4:27

venue somewhere a bit more tropical so I

4:29

actually applied for a job on

4:31

Hamilton Island and I was unsuccessful getting

4:33

that job and I was like well

4:36

actually maybe hospitality isn't for me so

4:38

I started applying for some sailboat

4:40

jobs in the Whitsundays.

4:42

They hired me so I

4:44

started off as a hostess on one of the

4:47

tourism boats up there. Oh very cool. Yeah that

4:49

was about five years ago now and so it's

4:51

just progressed from that. So tell me a bit

4:53

more I need to know what do you do

4:55

for work? How much money do you actually earn?

4:57

So I work in marine pilotage. Oh yeah. A

4:59

bit of an unusual job. I at the

5:03

moment am earning just over 100k a

5:05

year. Yeah. We drive boats

5:07

and we go out to the middle of a

5:09

shipping channel where we run into the side of

5:11

a big ship that's still moving. We run into

5:13

the side of a big ship moving. Yeah exactly

5:16

we we kind of just smash into the side.

5:18

If there's a bit of a bang it's all

5:20

right and then we put

5:22

a very experienced mariner onto that ship so

5:24

he can navigate it through the reef. I've

5:27

heard of this. They're good

5:29

pilots but they've never been through that territory and

5:31

you need someone who's like really familiar with it

5:33

to like just get on for a short period

5:35

of time navigate through that and then they get off

5:37

right? Yeah yeah it is cool.

5:41

So how did you fall into that?

5:43

I mean it's a bit of a jump

5:45

to go from a hostess on a boat

5:47

to being in marine pilotage. Like what's the

5:49

segue there my friend? Yeah

5:51

it was quite random how it happened. I moved

5:53

to the islands where I'm living now and I

5:56

met up with a friend that I'd known

5:58

previously from the marine industry. And

6:00

she was working for this company already and so

6:02

she got me a job and I started out

6:05

as a casual deckhand. That was

6:07

almost two years ago now. And

6:10

now I'm the assistant manager two years later.

6:12

No, you're not. I am. That

6:14

is so cool. Congrats. Tell

6:17

me a bit more about island life though.

6:19

I want to segue back to this because

6:21

living remote full stop is expensive. But then

6:23

I feel like it might be super expensive

6:25

living remote but then also on an island.

6:28

So can you tell me a bit about

6:30

I guess your living situation? How do you

6:33

rent and pay for housing or do you

6:35

pay for housing? And you know what's food

6:37

like? Because I'm assuming you can't get your

6:39

roots. There's definitely no Uber Eats

6:41

so that does help with my savings.

6:44

Yeah, so living on an island it is

6:46

very expensive. I do want to say that

6:49

you know in my situation with my work

6:51

I am very privileged because I do have

6:53

some things provided with my job. Food

6:56

is probably the biggest expense that I

6:58

see. To be fair I'm probably a

7:00

little bit out of touch with mainland

7:02

prices. I mean I understand that prices

7:05

have gone up all over Australia. But

7:08

yeah, you know living up here for instance we're paying $2.85

7:10

for a litre of fuel. I

7:13

went to the supermarket the other day and

7:15

I paid $3.50 for a tin of chopped

7:17

tomatoes. No, you didn't. It's quite ridiculous. That's

7:19

like 99 cents at colds for me.

7:22

Sorry. It's ridiculous but

7:24

everything that comes to the island is

7:27

bought up on a barge. That just

7:29

adds a huge freight cost to all the

7:31

products that are bought to the island. Yeah,

7:33

it would. And also sometimes those products

7:35

are just not available. Quality, especially fruit

7:38

and vegetables, can be quite low sometimes.

7:40

I think I paid $10 the other

7:43

day for a very average bunch of

7:45

silverbeet. Of silverbeet? Yeah. That's

7:47

not even like an expensive exciting

7:49

vegetable. That's silverbeet. I know

7:52

but you still have to get your greens. I'm

7:54

not disagreeing. I actually really love a bit of

7:56

silverbeet. I grew up on a farm and I

7:58

feel like that stuff grows like weed. there

8:00

but paying 10 bucks for it would

8:02

give me the ick. Yeah, probably my

8:04

largest expense is my grocery bill at

8:07

the moment. Like I said, I am very

8:09

lucky in my job that things are

8:11

provided for me. For instance, I have a work

8:13

car that I don't have to pay for my

8:15

own car or fuel. Oh, very nice. And I

8:17

understand that everybody on the island is not privileged

8:19

to that like we are. My

8:21

rent is also subsidised by work, so I

8:24

think work subsidises it by about $300 a

8:26

week and I still end

8:28

up paying $170 a week. Okay,

8:30

that's pretty good because that would be expensive

8:32

rent otherwise. Yeah, it's really

8:34

lucky to live on the island without

8:37

rent supplied by your work. It would

8:39

be almost impossible just because there is no accommodation

8:41

available. Yeah, wow. Work

8:44

also covers most of my bills, so they

8:46

pay for my gas and my water and

8:48

my internet and the only bill I have

8:51

to pay for myself is my electricity. This

8:53

is becoming very appealing. Like I wasn't so

8:55

sold on remote work, but now you're like,

8:57

all of this stuff is covered. Also

9:00

I'm earning just over $100,000 per year. Does

9:03

that put you in a very attractive savings

9:05

position? It does. I had

9:08

never earned money like this before falling

9:10

into this role. I have hit

9:12

some pretty incredible savings goals

9:14

this year. Let's talk about

9:16

them. What are your big money

9:18

goals? My biggest money goal this year is to buy

9:21

property. I'm just going through

9:23

the process at the moment of pre-approval. Oh,

9:25

yes. I'm looking to purchase

9:28

an investment property hopefully in the next

9:30

month or two. Oh, that's so exciting.

9:32

That's so soon. Have

9:34

you got your deposit together in all of the

9:37

bowls in the right places? Yes,

9:39

I have my deposit ready. I have gone

9:41

through this process once before, but also living

9:43

on the island, it makes it very difficult

9:45

to view properties. Of course. It has

9:48

slowed me down a little bit in my search for

9:50

properties, but I think I've reached the point where I

9:52

may just have to purchase without viewing

9:54

the property first. Yes, right. Are

9:56

You purchasing remotely? Or are you purchasing back like

9:59

where your mommy? The like, what's a

10:01

plan we have location for these property

10:03

purchase at the moment. I'm looking at

10:05

Cannes in far North Queensland and is

10:07

that because you want to leave their

10:09

at some point or is this a

10:11

good investment opportunity or what does that

10:13

look like For me I think it

10:15

is a place where you can buy

10:17

a good investment opportunity. Also, if things

10:19

were to fall through with renting it

10:22

out and I did have to move

10:24

there, I would have access to employment.

10:26

Yeah, and I have lived there previously

10:28

so it's a place at Ces. Familiar.

10:30

To me near great hands as gorgeous as well.

10:32

so like I would not be mad if I

10:34

had to go and leave their like own. I

10:36

I have to live in far north Queensland. How

10:38

bad is that? Either it's

10:40

tropical. Paradise their minds the crook

10:42

house it is so beautiful or us

10:45

say probably purchase what are your other

10:47

big money goes I don't have too

10:49

many. What? I would call sorts her

10:51

money goals at the moment. I think once I kick

10:53

off. Buying. A property then

10:56

I'll start to look. But yeah, for

10:58

long time you know I'm not a

11:00

person. A particularly wants to work a full

11:02

time job for the next. Thirty. Years. Forty

11:04

years since I would really like

11:07

to find myself in a position

11:09

down the track where I can

11:11

work less. You know, If. That

11:13

looks like paying off property so that

11:15

I don't owe anything on it as

11:17

quick as possible. You know that the

11:19

probably my goals down the track. I

11:21

love that what do not working full

11:24

time will come to you is that

11:26

just finding out during the day like

11:28

how many days the way to we

11:30

talking that you would actually work like

11:32

give me an idea of what this

11:34

goal lifestyle looks like. So I think

11:36

my Physique Rostov would be. Four.

11:39

Days a week or three days a week. You

11:41

know, I have a lot of. Things.

11:43

That I would like to do on the side. And

11:45

maybe that. Could. Also

11:47

includes my own business

11:49

as though fun. Yeah.

11:53

I don't know what my own business would be that

11:55

I would really like to be able to support myself

11:57

and work for myself. I think that's probably my ultimate

11:59

goal. I love it, it is a lot of

12:01

stress, but it is definitely worth it. All

12:03

right, let's go to a really quick break

12:05

because on the flip side, I wanna ask

12:07

you, I guess about investments, about debt, and

12:09

your best and worst money habits. So guys,

12:11

don't go anywhere. All

12:17

right, Money Diarist, we are back and you

12:19

are living an island life in a very

12:21

remote part of Australia, which now you're telling

12:23

me about it, I'm kind of envious of,

12:25

like I just look at it and go,

12:27

oh my gosh, what on earth? This

12:30

is so far from what my reality is.

12:32

What do your days off look like if you're stuck on

12:34

a very remote island? What do you get up to? Well,

12:36

the only thing you can do on an island is go

12:39

on a boat. That's okay, you like

12:41

boats, I've heard. I do like boats,

12:43

even on my days off, I drive them. So

12:46

we will go around the islands,

12:48

go wakeboarding, just

12:50

lay on the beach, go for a bit of a snorkel,

12:53

trying it away from the crocodiles is my

12:55

ultimate goal. Ah, yeah, no thank you. But

12:58

to be fair, I actually don't have a whole lot

13:00

of spare time because I do work two jobs.

13:03

Two jobs? Yes, I do work

13:05

a second job. So I often use my days off

13:07

and also my annual leave to fit my second job

13:10

in. Tell me more, what is

13:12

this second job? You didn't mention that when I

13:14

said, what do you do for work and how

13:16

much money do you earn? I work for not

13:18

for profit in the environmental sector. Oh my gosh,

13:20

how did you forget that? It

13:23

is just a casual job and the hours

13:25

are very varying. Some weeks I

13:27

may not work at all and then others will do

13:29

30 hours a week. So that

13:32

job looks like a lot of

13:34

computer time as well, but I also do get to

13:36

go out into the field quite often

13:38

and work with traditional owners and

13:40

rangers on country. Oh my gosh, gorgeous. Yeah,

13:43

so I work on different islands and back

13:45

on the mainland doing that as well. So

13:48

what kind of income are you earning from

13:50

that in addition to your 100 grand in

13:53

your job in marine pilotage? So

13:55

that is a casual job, so I'm paid on

13:57

an hourly basis. As I mentioned,

13:59

it's very. sporadic for hours. Last

14:02

tax year I think I earned an extra

14:04

12 grand with that and I'm probably earn

14:06

about the same this year. Yeah that honestly

14:09

is so cool and the fact that you

14:11

get to I guess connect so much with

14:13

the land. I'm assuming you're learning a lot

14:15

as you you know do the work that

14:18

you do. I feel like that's a dream

14:20

that is very very cool. So

14:22

tell me now about investment. Do you have any

14:24

investments? If so what are they? If you don't

14:27

do you have a plan? So I've been doing

14:29

a little bit of listening to She's on

14:31

the Money. Oh my gosh great idea. Can't

14:33

recommend it more highly. I also have

14:36

a raise account which I've had for

14:38

about three years. Yeah.

14:40

And with downloading and

14:42

joining up with sharesies I now

14:45

have started a plan

14:47

to let my raise get up to

14:50

$500 and once it reaches $500 I'm

14:52

withdrawing that and putting into my sharesies

14:55

Oh I love this idea and I don't mean

14:57

to buddy in and tell you how to suck

14:59

eggs. That's not what I'm doing but did you

15:01

know that sharesies has just introduced roundups? So

15:04

you could like do that inside sharesies and

15:06

not change from one investment platform sell down

15:08

an asset that might decrease in value and

15:11

then transfer it to another one. I did

15:13

not know that and this is why I

15:15

listened. Well there you go. Hot tips. Love

15:18

the strategy. Obviously if we're exposing our money to

15:20

the share market for a short period of time

15:22

there could be some volatility and so that might

15:24

be another way to protect yourself but I'll let

15:27

you look into that and make your own decision.

15:29

It's just a little idea my friends. That's perfect.

15:31

Take out the middle man. Yeah I mean it's

15:33

a genius idea though like have you found that

15:35

having roundups has meant that there's just like money

15:38

there that you're like wow I really didn't feel

15:40

like that came out or wow that hit $500

15:42

way quicker than I thought it might.

15:45

Yeah I don't notice the money going

15:47

out of my account at all. I've had it for

15:49

so long that it's just been a part of my

15:51

account and budgeting all the time. I

15:53

really enjoy the roundup. I do too. It's

15:56

what I do because I like to think

15:58

of myself as a relatively lazy investor. stuff.

16:00

Like I've just like direct debited everything else that

16:02

happens and then I've got my roundups and sometimes

16:04

I log in and I'm like, oh, look at

16:06

me. That's so nice. Like I did all this

16:09

work, but I didn't. That's my

16:11

favorite. I want to know next. Do you

16:13

have any debts? If so, what are they?

16:16

If not, can I know a little bit more pervy detail

16:18

about the debt that you might take on for this

16:20

property purchase you're about to make? Well,

16:22

the only debt I have is my

16:24

hex debt. I am

16:27

feeling quite disheartened at the moment

16:30

about how large my hex debt is. It's up

16:32

to about $55,000. Yeah,

16:35

fair. I would feel stressed, but at the

16:37

same time it makes sense. I

16:40

think going through university and even

16:42

high school, hex debt was

16:44

always kind of sold to me as

16:46

an interest free loan, which in the

16:48

last year particularly it is certainly not.

16:50

I think my hex debt was raised

16:52

by about $4,000 last financial

16:55

year. That is my only debt. I

16:58

do also have a credit card, but I pretty

17:00

much just use it for points on larger

17:02

purchases and then pay it off immediately. With

17:05

the property that I'm looking to buy,

17:08

Cairns is still quite reasonably

17:10

priced. So I'm looking at

17:13

apartments in about $200,000 range

17:17

of which I have quite

17:19

a large deposit to put towards, whether I use

17:21

all of my money as a deposit or not.

17:24

That has a rental return on it

17:26

of about between $300 and $350

17:28

a week. That's

17:30

pretty good. When you look at that and go,

17:32

all right, well, it's a $200,000 apartment. I

17:36

can get good rental yield. Would you look

17:38

at putting less of a deposit down and

17:41

potentially putting money into an offset account? Is

17:43

that something that you've spoken to your broker

17:45

about structuring to make sure

17:47

it works really well for you? Yeah, that

17:49

is something that I have spoken to my

17:51

broker about and I will

17:53

be putting it in an offset account. Love.

17:55

We're all on the same page. I love

17:58

that. Tell me now, what do you think you're your

18:00

best money habit is? I

18:02

think I'm a really good saver. I know you're

18:04

a really good saver. Yeah,

18:08

which I will also discuss in

18:10

my worst money habits. But yeah, I

18:12

think I'm a really good saver. I was thinking

18:14

about this. I also purchased a lot of my

18:17

clothes, furniture, you

18:19

know, most things secondhand. My main

18:21

priority behind doing that is

18:24

probably because it's the most sustainable option, but

18:26

it's also led me to like be able

18:28

to save a lot more money by doing

18:30

that. How does that work if you're remote?

18:33

Like, is it still easy to, I guess,

18:35

get access to that market, you could say?

18:38

Like, I feel like you would have less

18:40

options. Yeah, so living up here,

18:42

everything in my house is actually provided by

18:44

work. So I don't need to go out

18:46

and buy furniture, plates, that

18:48

kind of stuff. When it comes

18:51

to clothes, I'm a big sucker

18:53

for Depop. Oh, I love Depop, same. I

18:55

love to be able to support people

18:57

as well in selling the clothes that they

18:59

no longer use rather than bigger companies. It's

19:01

genius, I love it. I feel like I check

19:03

Depop before I make any purchase nowadays as

19:05

well, because I'm like, oh, that's cute. Someone

19:07

might've put it on Depop and half the

19:09

time they have. Exactly, yeah, and that's quite easy

19:12

to get things sent up in the mail. It

19:14

does take about three weeks to arrive. There's

19:16

no instant gratification. Oh, I would suck up there.

19:19

I would forget that I'd ordered things and then

19:21

they'd turn up and it'd be like, oh yeah.

19:23

Yeah, I do end up at the post office quite a

19:25

lot up here. And segwaying from

19:27

that, what do you think your worst money

19:30

habit is? So yeah, as I mentioned,

19:32

I think I'm quite a good saver. I

19:35

think my attitude towards money has

19:37

shifted quite a lot lately. So

19:40

I think my worst money habits

19:42

are based on decisions that I

19:44

had made previously. I'm feeling quite

19:46

annoyed that I haven't prioritized investment

19:48

earlier on in my life, whether that

19:51

investment looks like contributing extra

19:53

to my super or buying

19:55

a property sooner or

19:57

also making voluntary payments on my head.

20:00

I feel annoyed because I did have the ability to

20:02

do that sooner and I haven't. But

20:05

you didn't have the tools and resources and knowledge that

20:07

you did now. You can't be too harsh on yourself.

20:09

I feel like so many times we look back and

20:11

go, oh my God, I would be so good if

20:13

I XYZ. Well, you know what? I'd be so good

20:15

if I started investing the day I was born, but

20:17

I didn't, did I? You're right.

20:20

It is a terrible game to play the hindsight game.

20:23

I think also one of my worst money habits

20:25

is I have always been a

20:27

good saver, as I mentioned, typically

20:30

before I moved up here, that savings

20:32

was always put towards travel. Yeah. So

20:34

I would get enough in my bank

20:36

account to go travelling, go travelling

20:38

to plead it and then come back

20:40

and start from scratch. Yeah, OK. And

20:42

so that is what I'm trying to

20:44

resist the urge to do these days. I'm a little bit

20:47

more grown up now. So if I can just resist that

20:49

urge to not quit my job and go on a trip

20:51

around the world, that would be great.

20:53

I mean, it sounds pretty cool. Like I think you

20:55

could convince me. I think we could

20:57

all do those things. But if that's your

20:59

worst money habit, like you're a very interesting

21:01

person. Like that is very, very cool. We've

21:04

talked a lot. I feel like you are absolutely

21:07

killing it and also living your best

21:09

life at the same time. Like marine

21:11

pilotage sounds slay. Like that sounds so

21:13

cool. But then also getting to work

21:15

in an NFP in the environmental sector

21:17

like that would nourish you. Like I

21:20

am assuming you're not doing it for

21:22

the money because you obviously earn a

21:24

lot in your bigger role.

21:26

But it just sounds like that is

21:28

so cool and you live on an

21:30

island. And yes, groceries are expensive, but

21:32

everything else kind of is subsidised. So

21:34

maybe it works out a bit. But

21:37

now that we've talked, what do you think it

21:39

would take to get you from a B plus

21:41

to an A or an A plus? Yeah,

21:44

definitely just need to prioritise the investing.

21:46

So if I can achieve my money

21:48

goal of buying a property this year

21:50

and once that's accomplished, move

21:53

on to the next thing, whether that's

21:55

property or a different investment. That's

21:58

definitely what I would need to take me to a... That

22:01

is so cool. I love that because we

22:03

know it's going to happen. Like you are

22:05

getting into property and you will be able

22:07

to leverage that one into the next one.

22:09

Even just knowing that you've got a bigger

22:11

deposit than you need for your first property

22:13

is going to be so constructive. Like I

22:16

am obsessed and I can't wait to see where

22:18

you go. Money Durrest, unfortunately that is all we

22:20

have time for today but I have loved getting

22:22

to know you, getting to know a bit about

22:24

your story. It makes me want to go live

22:27

on an island. I'm not sure my husband or

22:29

my impending baby is going to like that

22:31

idea but I'll pitch it to them

22:33

and see what they say. But

22:36

thank you so much. I think our community

22:38

is going to love this story because it

22:40

is so different and so pervy. So thank

22:42

you. Yeah, no worries. Thank you so much

22:44

for having me. Of course. The

22:52

advice shared on She's On The

22:54

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22:56

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22:58

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