This post is brought to you by VicSuper
Disclaimer: I really, really like money. A lot. I like earning it and I like saving it but honestly, I struggle a bit with the spending part. I’m actually very crap at spending money. I’m like Charlton Heston and his guns. ’FROM MY COLD DEAD HANDS!!!!’ I know most people have the opposite problem though which is why I decided to team up with VicSuper to bring you some tips to stop you from flinging your money around like confetti.
Even though that is really fun it’s not very helpful. VicSuper are also doing this rad thing where you can go and hold your current superannuation balance and there’s some cheeky footage of me holding mine. However in order to end up with a healthy pile of superannuation you need to start making some changes to your financial situation right now, starting with any money mistakes that are keeping you broke.
You think you’re living within your means
Just because you have $100 in your bank account doesn’t mean you should spend it. I worked with a woman many years ago who would live pay cheque to pay cheque. We earned the exact same amount of money yet she was always counting the days until her next pay went through. This is because she wouldn’t think twice about spending $200 on shoes every week or drinking $25 cocktails when everyone else was having beer. Technically speaking she wasn’t in debt and she could always pay her rent but she spent every cent she earned so she never got ahead.
You don’t think you’re worth it
One of the reasons it took me so long to go full time with my blogging and writing career is because I couldn’t picture myself making a fruitful living from it. I didn’t want to be a full time blogger scraping by, I wanted to be a full time blogger who could afford to go on holidays and buy wine that comes in a bottle. As soon as I started charging my clients what I was worth, instead of what I thought they would pay, I managed to increase my yearly income enough to go full time with my business. The same principal applies when you’re asking for a pay rise or applying for a job in a higher income bracket. You will never earn 150k a year if you don’t think you’re worth it.
You’ve settled
I used to work with a guy who was a teacher’s assistant at a special needs school I worked at. He was a qualified teacher but had let his registration lapse and couldn’t be bothered re-applying (I can kind of see where he’s coming from – teacher registration forms are a special kind of torture). So he was getting paid almost half as much money for doing almost the same job because he was settled and comfortable where he was. It would have been fine if he wasn’t constantly complaining about how he wished he had more money and that he was wasting his degree. Just have a quick look at your current situation and see if you’ve settled for less than you want. It almost always takes extra work to earn extra money but if money is your goal, you just have to go for it.
You’re not thinking about your future
How much do you wish you could go back in time and not spend $1000 on a too small leather jacket on an over priced holiday to Italy that you couldn’t afford? Not all frivolous purchases are bad but lots of them are. Just take a moment to think before you spend a lot of money. Do you need a hotel room that costs $600 per night? Or can you survive in a basic $100 room and pop that extra $500 away for a rainy day?
You’re a bit lazy
You don’t cancel subscriptions, you don’t do your taxes and you don’t think about putting money away in your super. Even I’m guilty of this one. I’ve made three separate attempts to roll my super and each time I’ve been sent back another form to fill out and I’ve become so annoyed and bored, I’ve given up. It’s very naughty behaviour and it has to stop.
The good news is from today, VicSuper are giving you the chance to physically hold your superannuation balance in your hands – head to www.getsuperactive.com.au to see your super as cash and for more information . Here’s a lil’ video of me stroking all that cold hard cash…
I kept joking to the security guards that I was going to take off with the money but I wouldn’t have even been able to carry it all. At the end of the experience they ask which pile of money you’d like to keep. I was like the big one. Obviously. I have all these fantasies about being a rich old lady dripping in diamonds and living in a brownstone in the West Village in New York, living on a steady diet of champagne and caviar . I’m going to need the big pile of money to make that happen. How big will your pile of money be?
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Do make lots of money mistakes? Is there anything getting in the way of you having more dosh in your life?
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14 Comments
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Fun fact at the end. I feel better looking already.
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Did you sign up to the email list though? It really only works if you do that. 🙂
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Super is so boring but so important. I rolled all mine up and it was super mega time consuming because I’d got married and changed my name in the meantime so I had to get all these notarised certificates and such like sent off and it was all “urggghhhhh” but now everything’s in the one place and I keep a close eyeball on it!
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Oh I know I really need to get my shit together with it this year, especially as someone who is a business owner. No ones putting it aside for me! EEEEEP!
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I thought at 30(ish) Super wasn’t something I needed to really worry about yet. Then I checked how much I’ll actually need for retirement and the sum is staggering at something like $2 million. All I can say is I’m taking it a lot more seriously now and making sure to make additional contributions.
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The thought of saving $2 million dollars is so daunting isn’t it? It’s something like 10k a year for 40 years…. really better get on that if I want to retire before I’m 70!
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You’ve just reminded me to get making those voluntary repayments, because I’ve worked for myself for the past 7 years I have missed out on 7 years of super, I dare not think about how much $ I’ve missed out on and all that interest!!!!!!!!!!! ARGHHHH – Great post and video!
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Urgh! Me too – I’ve only been working for myself for a year but I really need to get my shit together. I’m starting to panic about it now!
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Great post and I’m so guilty of being lazy – am off to snag that $5k in forgotten shares that someone just contacted me about. I need to give myself an uppercut!
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That’s the weird thing about super is that it seems like it’s not real money right? It just kind of floats around and no one pays attention to it. Gotta get that shit sorted.
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Great tips and couldn’t have come at a better time! I have always been the ‘sensible’ one of the relationship when it comes to money, but there are definitely ways I could improve! I am TERRIBLE at cancelling or downgrading subscriptions. I ended up paying insurance on a car I sold for two years before I realised and cancelled. Terrible!
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Oh my god I can’t believed you paid insurance on a car you didn’t own! Insurance is so expensive! Glad you figured it out and cancelled. I can relax now. Phew!
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Not sure if you can pay your super monthly if you are self employed, but even if you can’t you can set up a fortnightly or monthly automatic transfer into your ‘super’ savings account and then transfer the lump sum at the end of the financial year every year. That way you don’t have to think about it until June each year and you can top it up if you get any unexpected windfalls. If you calculate the amount as a percentage of what you earn then you will also increase the amount every year when you do your tax return. As women it is really, really important that we make good financial decisions for ourselves so that we are not left in a tumble down house on a miniscule pension and 20 cats for company when we retire (although I can forgive the 20 cats)! 🙂
The other really important thing to do is to look at where it is invested within your super. DO NOT leave it in the ‘balanced’ or ‘conservative’ options!!!! You will lose money compared to the other options. 80% of people (men and women) do this because they can’t be bothered educating themselves about investments, risk and active management of their super, as it all seems too complicated. It really isn’t! Divide your super into quarters and invest each quarter into different options depending on your risk profile, that way if one tanks, you still have the others making a profit. If you are at least 10 years away from retirement, then your super has time to recover from any share market crashes. I also recommend getting a subscription to Money magazine for 12 months (or borrow it from the library) and read all the articles & especially the advice columns to get some ideas on what you might be comfortable with and what your other investment options might be.
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While these are all great tips, I find the money mistake that I make the most often is spending lots of little amounts of money. I’m very hesitant about shelling out a big wad of cash on a single item, but I will happily buy lots of cheap little goodies all over the place. It adds up very quickly and it’s quite a sneaky trap. I find that I spend most of my fun money on little purchases rather than large ones.
