The Happy Saver Podcast - Personal Finance in New Zealand

Living in Queenstown is a dream to many but it ain’t easy making it happen. All of that stunning scenery you feast your eyes on everyday does not pay the bills and buying not just A house, but your first house takes a lot of work and dedication. Kurt and Ruth have dedication in spades and they have created a whole of life plan to make sure they don’t just survive there, but thrive.

In January 2016 Ronnie woke up one morning and went to a job she didn’t much like and wondered how she had reached 39 years of age and still wasn’t rich. In fact she was just one or two pay cheques away from having next to nothing. So she YouTubed “how to be rich” and her journey out of debt began.

Jane loves buying individual shares in companies. She enjoys the research, the tracking of her investments and the sporadic hunt for the “next big thing”. Find out how this self taught investor fits share trading in around her busy family life.

SmartShares is an investment product I use and I met their product manager Dean Anderson because I kept contacting him with lots of questions regarding my own ETF funds. He struck me as a guy with a good story to tell and I knew there was more to him than just index funds. During our chat he told me about where, how and most importantly why he is an investor and you will come away from listening to him and put some more thought into your own money journey, of that I am certain.

Today I’m telling you all about my sister Liz. While I inherited the saver gene, she inherited the spending gene but a life of debt finally caught up with her and she has spent the last couple of years completely changing her mindset about the money in her life and is now firmly on a path to financial independence.

I met Victoria via my blog when we began to chat by email. So when I knew I wanted to create a podcast and wanted to interview a woman who gives her financial situation careful consideration, she was high up on my list. This is a snapshot of a calm and calculated Kiwi woman having a go and succeeding at setting her own financial path.

If you thought that every teenager spends their days wagging school and walking around with their head down looking at the latest iPhone, then think again. Today we meet James who is finishing up his final year of school before heading on to University in 2018. He is no slouch and is involved in a huge variety of community groups, holds down a job, listens to his mother and is saving hard for the future.

On this episode of the Happy Saver Podcast I talk with Rachel and David who are a New Zealand success story. When quite young they stumbled upon buying rental properties, in Auckland no less, and over time they bought a few more while working their day jobs. But it was their day job that enabled them to pay off their mortgages and today they go into detail about how they did it.

Lisa followed a fella all the way back to NZ and set up a successful business in which she toiled day after day. All her time and all of her energy went into it until one day she was forced to walk away, with nothing except a mortgage laden building. Broke, tired and uncertain of the future she started all over again. With no idea about what to do with money she set about teaching herself how and where to invest and now, at the young age of 44 she has reached financial independence and is about to retire!

This week I’m excited to tell you about Ryan Johnson, a fellow blogger on personal finance in New Zealand. He had a very interesting start to his working career as it involved a pack of 52 playing cards. He is self taught when it comes to investing and is putting careful thought into exactly where to invest his savings and he openly shares that with me today. With student loans now paid off he has bucked the home ownership trend for now and has chosen to rent rather than buy a home. Month by month he is building a strong financial footing and he has learned a tonne about investing along the way.