Chapter 1: What happens if you change your finances by just $100 a week?
Welcome to How Do They Afford That, the podcast that peeks into the financial lives of everyday Australians. I'm Michael Thompson. I'm an author and the co-host of the business news podcast, Fear and Greed.
And as always, I'm with Canna Campbell, financial planner and founder of Sugar Mama TV, the financial literacy platform covering YouTube, podcast books, Instagram, threads, TikTok, and a renowned paper rustler. Hello, Canna.
Boston sorry indeed indeed look today's episode's about a I would like to say it's a fairly simple idea what happens if you change your finances by just $100 a week and that might be saving it might be investing it might be cutting it might be redirecting it but
Chapter 2: Is it realistic to save or redirect $100 a week during a cost of living crisis?
And it's based on this idea of that doesn't sound like a huge amount, but does it add up quickly and does it have a greater impact in certain areas than others? $100 a week. Is that realistic? I know it's a cost of living crisis. There is a lot of pressure, but we're not saying find $1,000 a week. It's $100.
Chapter 3: How can awareness of spending help in finding extra money?
Look, it's very subjective, and I think most people already would say that is very hard right now. But the truth is, it's actually not about the $100. It's about the consistency. It's about the intention, like having a go and trying to find $100, whatever you can do. getting started and building that momentum.
Chapter 4: What are effective ways to cut $100 from your budget?
So I don't think it really matters right now the amount, whether it's $10 a week, $50 a week or $100 a week. It's about stepping up and having a crack at trying to find some extra money that you can then use intentionally and redirect to improve your financial well-being.
Okay. If we were just in theory to use the $100 as our- Fine. As a, just an experiment. Okay. For this episode, cutting $100, we're going to go through the options.
Chapter 5: How can earning an extra $100 a week impact your finances?
We've kind of mentioned saving, investing, cutting, redirecting, earning an extra $100 a week, all those things, cutting $100. How would you do it?
Well, like so many things in life, it starts with awareness. You know, going through your budget but also going through your transactions, you know, making sure your budget actually matches how you really are spending because a budget is an intention. The transaction is the truth and reality of where your money actually goes.
Oh, that would be great on a T-shirt. It would need to be a very large T-shirt to fit all of that in because it's probably a bit longer.
Yeah.
And look, when you look at the transactions and you can sort of be a lot more accountable and honest and, you know, go, well, look, I say I only spend $200 on my paper budget over here, but look, I'm actually spending $300, you know, on groceries. That's what you need to catch. And that's where you need to get back in control and identify the wastage and the leakage.
And you've got to look at everything. You can't sort of pick and choose the stored expenses that are convenient to your brain to look at.
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Chapter 6: What should you consider before investing $100 a week?
You've got to look at the food. You've got to look at the subscriptions. And keeping in mind that subscriptions, where they're coming out of, may necessarily be a different account or for a credit card. You've got to keep an eye as to where all these things are being paid and checking all those things. looking at your groceries, but you also may be eating out a lot.
Chapter 7: How can redirecting spending improve your financial well-being?
So you might think, oh, well, it's fine, I'm actually sticking to my groceries budget, but really you're just spending less on the groceries because you're eating out more or getting, say, home delivery or takeaway. And the impulse spending and, of course, all those utilities that we all have to pay for are part of adult life.
And it's not about necessarily one big cut to find, for example, the $100.
Yeah.
do understand that it might actually be a combination of different areas. It might even be 10 different areas that each save you $10 a month that help find you that $100. This is what we need to do if we really want to try and make a shift and improvement in our financial well-being to find that extra money that we can actually do something with.
Okay. Instead of cutting, what about earning $100 a week? You are the side hustle queen, right?
Yeah.
Oh, we have so many episodes on this, but there are, you know, and I really am big on trying to earn lots of money. Obviously, keeping in mind, you know, you might have young children, you may have responsibilities, you may be also working really long hours and you're, you know, completely brained at the end of the day. There are people in certain situations that can't actually do that.
But yes, when you find ways to earn extra money, it's unlimited. You know, the sky's the limit. And we've spoken about doing market research, doing surveys online, decluttering your home, getting rid of unused, unwanted clothes, sporting equipment, furniture, to help come up with some extra money, becoming a delivery partner.
an Uber driver where you can clock on and clock off, you decide the hours that you want to work, you know, looking at your skills that you already have and how can you monetize them.
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Chapter 8: What are the benefits of automating your financial habits?
self-control or discipline because it's done obviously by hr your payroll team and you're obviously letting more money go into superannuation that's already got you know some money i would hope in super so it's obviously going to have a bigger impact on the long-term compounding effect yeah so yes super is important it's i don't imagine too much regret would come with it as long as you take into consideration the accessibility issue yeah
You know, if you were 20 and you said, I'm going to put $100 per week, I'd say, well, hang on, just think that through as to whether that's right for you. And for some people, that is the perfect strategy. And it's about understanding your values and your goals, of course, here. But, you know, you do need to keep that in mind.
And sometimes if we're talking about $100 here, perhaps there's a balance. You know, it's $100 investing, $100 into super.
Okay. In terms then of investing, other forms of investing, is that enough to get you started building a portfolio? Oh my God, just the energy just radiating off you just then. It's as though you grew to twice your size in a heartbeat.
Yes, to answer your question. So, all right, this is where micro-investing does come because it's a great place to get started because you can start investing with small amounts of money like $10. However, as I like to say with micro-investing, it's a great starting point, but it's not the finish line.
I would prefer for someone, and I'm going to get a little bit – I don't mean to be arrogant, but I'm coming from a place of – love and care for someone to actually stretch themselves in a healthy, joyful way where they actually see a meaningful improvement and uplift in their financial well-being.
But ideally, investing in parcels of shares rather than going through micro-investing and investing, for example, in parcels of, say, $500 or $1,000. Yep. And I will admit, yes, of course, I'm slowing people's momentum down because they're not investing $100 per week.
They've got to wait until five weeks have passed and they've got their full $500 or 10 weeks have passed and they've got their full $1,000 ready to invest. But absolutely, you can use that money to start investing. And I think it's such an important thing here as to what we're talking about here is it's about getting started because you can then level up from here.
But I ran some really very basic numbers here. And if we assumed a net return of 7% per annum, And you were to start with a baseline of zero, so nothing, it's just starting with your $100 per week, that's it, and never increased it.
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