From £60K in Debt to Financial Freedom: Money Mechanics with Sarah Poynton-Ryan

In this episode of Girls in Property, Athena Dobson is joined by money mentor and author Sarah Poynton-Ryan for an honest, empowering chat all about money — the good, the bad, and the emotional.

If you’ve clicked on this one, chances are you’re either working your way out of debt or just looking to get a better grip on your finances. Either way, Sarah’s story will strike a chord.

She opens up about how she went from being £60,000 in debt to building a successful career helping others take control of their money. The conversation covers the difference between good debt and bad, smart ways to manage your finances, and why doing your due diligence before investing is so important.

They also get into the emotional side of money, something we don’t talk about enough, and why lifting the lid on money struggles is key to moving forward.

Whether you’re just getting started in property or want to feel more confident with your cash, this episode is full of practical tips, relatable chat, and real-life advice. Don’t miss it.

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Disclaimer: None of the content in our podcast is intended to constitute legal or financial advice. All interviews and statements are the thoughts & opinions of the hosts and guests themselves and should be taken as such. Any information used from this podcast is done so at your own risk.

Transcript

0:01

Good morning everyone and welcome to today's episode of the Girls in Property podcast. Today I have somebody super, super awesome that I want to introduce you to. I wanted to get this person on the podcast for a while purely for personal reasons as well, because I'm really interested in the topic of conversation today from a personal perspective. But also just because I think it's a really important conversation that not enough of us are having at the moment and I think more of us need to do it. and to make it less of a taboo subject as well. So whether you're driving the kids to school or sweeping up the garden or some gardening or weeding, as somebody said to me the other day that they were doing de-weeding the garden, know, grab a cup of tea, listening, because today's conversation is going to be absolutely fantastic. So today, without further ado, I would love to introduce Sarah Pointon-Ryan. Hey, Sarah. I'm good. This is a return trip for you to the Girls on Property podcast, isn't it? it is, yeah. Thanks for having me back. That's okay. So when you originally came on the podcast all that time ago, was actually, think was, dare I say, I think it was the three of us that dared to be on the podcast plus yourself. So there was four voices on the podcast. Yeah, crazy. I can't believe we did that. But today it's just the two of us. So I'm super, super interested in this because today we're going to be talking all about money and money mechanics, aren't Yeah. And specifically around debt. and money and how we can kind of use money to our advantage and not be scared of it in whatever position that we're in. So Sarah, what would you say if you had to like introduce yourself again to everybody for people who don't know who you are, even though you're very prevalent in the money game, and I'm sure lots of people know about you, but where would you say it all started for you? Like how would you introduce yourself and say how you got on to be who Sarah is today with your books and your coaching and everything you do now? Yeah, yeah, hello to everyone that's listening. It's great to be here. I'm an investor. That's probably the label that I use the most often. And I, because I'm an investor now, I have moved into financial and investing literacy education and property investment education. It kind of all started in around 2015. Well, actually a couple of years before that, I started Spending more money than I had, let's just put it like that. So by the time 2015 came around, I was in about 60,000 pound of debt, very expensive debt, the credit cards, the overdrafts, the loans, that sort of stuff. And I was at a point in my life, I'd just got married and I wanted to look to the next chapter. I wanted to look at where are we gonna buy a house, have a baby, go traveling, get a dog, like what are we gonna do? And everything we tried to do just kept coming back to be great, but we've got no money. So I decided in 2015 that that just couldn't be my life. It just wasn't an option for me to live the rest of my life like that. So I started a consultancy business, well, I started a rent-to-rent business, for those of you that are in the property space. For those of you that are not in the property space, it's basically where you sublet properties and you take a margin on to offer each of the properties that you manage. And alongside that, built a portfolio building consultancy business. Most people listening will probably know that sourcing or packaging. And I did that to one, because it was high cashflow for me. And obviously I needed to make more money. But what it actually gave me was a real insight into how people with money behave, how people with money talk about money, how people with money... treat money and it woke me up to a realization that actually I had no idea about how money worked and you know school hadn't taught me, my parents hadn't taught me because they didn't know, no one had taught them, my friends didn't know, like none of us really knew about how money really worked, how debt really worked, how all that sort of stuff was impacting our like bigger life. So I made it my mission one to clear my debt and I did that. in 23 months from the point I started my business in 2015. was debt free, £60,000 was debt free in 23 months. And then from sort of 2017, I was all of a sudden making money and it was like my money that I could keep. And again, I was spending a lot of time with high net worth individuals, investors and people. And I asked, you know, what should I do with this money now that I've got it? So I'd one, I don't end up in the same situation again, and two, so I can actually start to better understand how money works and what it does. So I got advice and I started working with people and I started buying houses at that point. I started investing in buy-to-let's because it's what I knew, it's what I trusted. And over time, you know, I've bought and sold and I've kept some, you know, we rent some out. And then I've moved on to buying other assets and starting to understand, you know, crypto and, you know, art and whiskey and these sorts of things. I then wrote the book in 2023 called Money Mechanics. And the reason I wrote that book is because I'd realized over the sort of five years before that, as I was doing more and more and more, or learning more about how money worked, people that I was speaking to just had no idea. And I realized that we as a community of people, if you don't grow up with money, generally we don't talk about it. People, the really wealthy people that I was spending time with, talked about money all the time. Talked about it like it was a great tool, it was a positive thing. And actually then, when I spent time with people who didn't really have any money, didn't grow up from money, money had this real negative connotation. Talking about money was bad manners. You didn't discuss debt with other people. And I thought that doesn't make any sense. So the reason I wrote the book was because I thought if I just share the journey that I'd gone on from getting into debt to getting out of debt and moving forward, maybe I could help the trajectory of like one or two or 10 people's lives go from where I was. So it wasn't quite as painful. And now, since I launched the book in 2023, we've sold thousands of copies. I don't know how many exactly. We run workshops on how to stabilize income, recover from debt. and invest with intention. And I now do workshops for companies like employee, financial wellbeing workshops. do em financial workshops for kids, which is amazing, like 14 to 17 year olds, where we talk about understanding what a payslip tells you and understanding what taxes and stuff like this, which, had I been taught at school, all those things, I wouldn't have got myself well. I might still got myself in some debt, but at least I would have had some concept of what it was doing to me in the long run. so, yeah, my mission really is very simple. We simplify money and I'm on a mission to help a billion people to get confidence and clarity and use their money in a better way. I love that. I love that. And I love your mission and I love the purpose that you have with it. So let's continue that mission today and let's help all of the listeners to really think to themselves about their money and their situation because I think what happens is, and you said it yourself Sarah, I think a lot of people almost get ashamed. So for example, I know for a fact that there'll be listeners who are in debt at the moment. ah You know, we have our own debt situation going on in our own, in my own family household because life is the way it is, know, me and me and Steve both decided to become business owners, neither one of us have a full time job. And with that, we have a mortgage to pay, we have bills to pay, there's a lot of situations that come with that. And I think the more that we're open and honest with that, it allows other people to be open and honest about that. One thing that you did say that really struck a chord with me where I thought, wow, that's incredible, is just going back. So you were 60,000 pounds in debt, and you managed to get out of that debt in what was it 23 months. How did, what was the first step to overcoming into being on that journey to getting out of 60,000 pounds worth of debt in 23 months? There's a couple of things I made. I made two sacrifices intentionally. Whether they were the right ones looking back now, I don't know, but I'll tell you what they were. One, I made a commitment to myself that any spare money I had, I would put to my debt. And the second one was that I would commit and go hell for leather and build in my business despite everything else in my life. Now, putting all my money to my debt. I think for me that was probably the right choice because that helped chisel it away. going hell for leather in my business and making it work despite everything else in my life probably wasn't the right choice because it damaged relationships. I wasn't particularly healthy. Like I was making loads of money, but I wasn't actually very happy. And as life moves on, I've realized that back really, really in the early days, I was just obsessed with making money. Like I wanted to bill money, bill money, because that was the target. make the money clear the debt, make the money clear the debt. One thing I'll say to kind of caveat that is that money becomes very empty if when you earn it, you feel shit still. And actually, the lots of clients that I've worked with over the years now are mentor people and so on. We talk about like, much money do you want to earn? Why do you want to earn it? And you know, I 10 grand a month, I five grand a month, whatever it is. And when you actually ask them why they want that money, often they can't answer the reason why, like it's just a shiny number that someone else has said somewhere along the line. And for me, it was that. Obviously I had my debt and that was the intention, but it was to get to these milestones that were actually other people's milestones. They didn't really matter to me. So when I started to get to them, they felt really empty and what At the time I thought as you know, I was young, I think I was like 32 then. I thought that meant I just needed more, more, more, more, more, more. And when you just want more, more, more, more, more, it's never enough. I didn't really set goals with intention around my money. Whereas now I do things a little bit differently is that I look at, I want to, you know, let's say I want to try and grow the business by a hundred thousand pounds this year. I ask why, why is it that? And what's that going to create in my life that's real and tangible so that when I hit it, I know that I've achieved it as opposed to just like waiting for it. And in the first couple of years, worked, you know, I worked, I was at my desk at six in the morning and I was working till 11, 12 at night. Like I worked and worked and worked and I did go hell for leather and it worked. But I think probably if I'd have gone a little bit slower, I'd have probably been a little bit happier. So, yes, I did it in 23 months, but it wasn't necessarily good for me to do that. But that's the choice I made at the time. I just, every spare penny I had, instead of spending it on festival tickets, which I'd done for years and going out and spending it all, I just decided that everything I had that was spare, that I didn't need to pay my bills, would go to my debt. And it did, and yeah, 60 grand, but it took 23 months to do that. Yeah, you know, it's a really tricky one and I don't know if the listeners have this for themselves is what you said with that one and the sacrifices you've got to make. So for example, you know, I completely agree and with that I always think to myself, right, any money that we've got to spare, let's pay the debt off, let's pay it off. But at the same time, you then get in this cycle where all that you do is work, pay debt, work, pay debt. And then what happens is you're in your 30s, so I'm 33. And we don't have kids, we have no responsibilities. And I'm like, what are we doing? We're a young couple. We should be going on holiday. We should be having fun. We should be doing things. But no, the money that we're earning is going to paying debt. And that's the right thing to do. But then in your head, you're literally like, but you feel like you're not living. You feel like you're not living day to day because of potentially the choices that you've made in life. Yeah, and I think there's some strategy to fixing this. I speak about this a lot in the book and a lot of the workshops that we do now is that one, don't know whether we, most people don't know what debt they should clear and what debt they should leave. And actually there's a difference between the two, which we can get into. And the other thing is most people don't have an emergency fund. So when you walk out your house and you've got a flat tire, If you've not got an emergency fund and you've just, let's say you've just been particularly long paying off a credit card, paying off a credit card, then you've got flat tire. The only money you've got is the credit card to use. So they put it back on the debt. They get their tire, then they chip away, they get in again, again, they get it down. And then the only money they've got is their debt and their boiler goes in their house. So now they have to use a credit card. So they put it back on debt. The banks have taught us, convinced us, brainwashed us to believe that borrowed money is a really good way of managing our money. And actually it's not. And again, we can get into that in a second, but the number one thing that everybody must have before they start thinking about like chiseling away at like big chunks of debt is having an emergency fund, which is like probably about three months of your living expenses, but actually anywhere between a month and six months, depending on who you are and your risk profile and stuff. But if you said about three months of your living expenses, two months is a good start. If you do that for, instead of clearing credit cards, you put that aside first and then it sits there and it does nothing. It just sits there, like in a as high interest account as you can get it. And then you start chipping away at your debt. What happens when you've got a flat tire is you use the money that's there for flat tires and your debt continues to go down as opposed to that cycle that you've just described, which is clear my debt, need to spend it, clear my debt, need to spend it, clear my debt, need to spend it. The other thing is that most people are on minimum payments with all their debt. And actually when you look at the actual numbers of that, it's a really dangerous game to play. It's very expensive game because, you know, the, call it the minimum payment trap in the book and in workshops, because most people think, and I did the same, if I stick to minimum payments, it's the best way for me to stay in control of it. And if I'll just chip it away and eventually it'll be gone. But what most people don't realize is that the average UK credit card is around three and a half thousand pounds, ish. Depending on your interest rate, et cetera, if you stick to minimum payments on a three and a half grand em credit card, it takes 27 years to clear a credit card, right? If you stick to fixed payment, so it would start at about 72 pound a month, that would be around the price. If you just stuck to 72 pound fixed payment, that 27 years reduces to four years in 11 months. Wow. an emergency fund and you get off minimum payments, that cycle starts to shift in your favor, whereas the banks don't tell us this bit, no one taught me this bit. And actually when you start chipping away at it, then it has a bigger impact because you're clearing your capital, not just your interest. And that stops that cycle being quite so consistent. Oh, I love it. I love this conversation. I don't think people have this conversation enough. I really don't. Like you said, I think it's a real taboo subject. I certainly did not grow up talking about money. Like it just wasn't a conversation that we had. And now I think that people are fearful to even admit that they're in debt or admit that they're having money problems because it's seen that they've made bad choices. It's seen that they're quite weak, for example. And that's not true. It's not true. And I think if everyone was a bit more open... into learning and developing, then they would get themselves out of it a lot quicker. Yeah, I think there's a generational thing here, right? So if I talk to my nan who's 81, she says to me often, I'm so proud of how successful you are, but I wish you could do it without talking about how much money you make. Right? Because generationally, it's just bad manners for me to talk about money. Like it doesn't, she can't understand why I talk about money quite as much as I do. And that ultimately is the problem, is that most of us have got a grandparent or a parent. or caregiver of some description who's told us for our whole lives, don't talk about money. It's rude to ask how much people earn. Don't ask for more, you know, don't get pay rises. Just be okay, set or accept, the line. And, you know, I find that fascinating because we have to be able to talk about money if we're to move forward with it. And yet we don't. And it's, it's mad to me, but yeah, even now I have some conversations. Definitely a generational thing. the older people that I speak to, like the older someone is, generally the more weird they are about being open about money. Cause it's all very kind of closed off. But I talk to people sort of younger than me, 15 year olds, 17 year olds, 25 year olds, actually they're much more open about it. And I think that's fascinating. And I think, you know, The shame and the embarrassment that comes with being in debt is real, right? And I remember it. And the pressure of being able to keep up appearances and also behind the scenes handle everything, I remember it. Like I remember how hard it was. I had a business to everybody else. It looked like I was doing really well. I had a company, I was busy. You we were selling a lot, but that's fine because it doesn't matter how much money you make if you don't... manage it well, you're not going to have enough, right? So the important thing we have to remember is that you are where you are. Your financial situation is not an indication of your intelligence, your self-worth, your value as a human being, your contribution to the planet. It's just where you are. It's just money. And money's neutral. The emotion attached to money is what we apply to it. So if instead of thinking, my God, it's terrible. I'm terrible because I got into debt. I'm a failure. I'm all these things. If we try to just say, okay, well, I'm in debt. This is the number. What's the strategy to get out of it? And we try to, it's hard to remove the emotion because it's heavy. But if we try to approach it with a more rational approach and it's just to have a roadmap to get to the end, you can just step by step, step by step, stop chipping away at it. But we've got to understand is that it's not your fault. You've been playing a rigged game. we've not, the society, the finances and the education and everything is rigged to make the system wealthier. It's not rigged for us to win. You're playing in a rigged game and you're blaming yourself for losing. That doesn't make any sense. So when you understand that, actually you can start to think, well, it's not my fault. So I'm going to just get rid of the emotional shit that goes with it. So what's the plan to get out of it? And that then becomes a very rational step-by-step process. Yeah, I love that. Okay, and we're gonna get into that. honestly, like Sarah, I love this conversation because I just sit here and I'm like, exactly. I'm like nodding along. I'm like, exactly. And you're right. It's like a Vegas game. You know, like the house always wins. It's the same. It really is. But okay, so before we get into the depths of it, I'm fascinated to go there. What would you say at the moment that you're celebrating? Because we love to celebrate on this podcast. So I am super proud of something that we've done recently, which was em a workshop. We were invited by a client of mine, name's Ruth, and she runs workshops for vulnerable kids, actually in Wales. em And she invited us to be the financial literacy division, if you like, syllabus of her workshop series that she does for kids. And most recently we were in Wales and we did a workshop to like 14 to 16 year olds. And this morning I got an email from the 14 year old, youngest girl that was in that room, just saying that she's learned a lot. And I sent them a challenge on the day, which was, could they go and make 300 pounds in 30 days? And she emailed me this morning to say that she's still working on it. It's not been 30 days. She's been putting her things on vintage. She's asked her mum to do some paid work and she's starting to plan how she's going to use her money. For me, that is like everything because that's a 14 year old that we've managed to catch to help them to understand their payslip better when they get it, what taxes, how to make more money, stabilize their income and plan for their future. And I'm super proud of that. And we're celebrating that in the business at the minute because we literally got the email this morning. yeah. and isn't that what this is all about? like it's just about changing one person's trajectory and I love that I absolutely love that I remember when I was younger the most funniest thing is when I was 11 years old I set up a tuck shop out the back of my backpack at school and mum used to drive me to Costco get Oreos rainbow dust all obviously wholesale and then I used to sell it for quite a profit Amazing. used to buy the Oreos for about 50p but sell them for like £1.50 at school which was ludicrous but I was like you know what you're at school it's a captive market like do want them for second break would you not? I was really young and they were literally in my backpack. The problem that I had was when I started to introduce chewing gum because that was what was wanted but then the teachers found out because all the kids were sticking all the gum under the desk and I got caught. That's hilarious. but that's what it's all about. It's about, everyone talks about vintage, by the way. I feel like I need to get on vintage. Everyone's talking about it. Yeah. great for selling stuff, but like I've bought an outfit for my cousin's wedding. It was 12 quid, it was 10 pounds and then like two pounds for delivery. And it's a beautiful worn ones, black and white jumpsuit. Like it is brilliant. I bought a blazer for a hen do that I was on this weekend. And it needs to be a particular color, which I wouldn't generally wear. So I was like, I'll get vintage. was like six quid. And You know, people laugh at me because they're like, Sarah, but you can afford to buy things. I'm like, yeah, but I want to keep that. I'd rather buy a six pound blazer and invest 40 pounds than go and buy a 46 pound blazer that I wear once. And vintage is amazing for that. So you can either, you know, I could sell it again or I think vintage is brilliant. You know what? I'm going to really get into vinted. I never do it. I always just bind. You know what? Today is the day I'm gonna chip make a change because of what you just said. One of the things I talk about in the book is if you invest, sorry, I've also got a podcast and one of the episodes on the podcast, we talk about how you can start to build your emergency fund. And I set the challenge of if you can go and find 10 pound a day, every day for 30 days, that's a starting point because you get into the pattern. And the episode talks about all the different ways you can do that. And the first thing is go through your house and pull out all the old rubbish that you don't wear, don't use, don't want anymore. Everything from, you know, the saucepans that are sat in the dusty back of your cupboard that you've not used for ages, to the shirts that you don't wear anymore or the jeans that don't fit you anymore. Get it all on Vinted and just start there. Imagine if you just make 10 pound a day. If you made 10 pound a day every day for a year and put that all in emergency funds, you'd have your emergency fund or most people would have their emergency fund. I love that. Wow. Brilliant. And fantastic celebration as well. I love that. What am I celebrating at the moment? Do you know what? I'm celebrating the fact that just with me and my sort of personal brand and Girls and Property and also separate to that, it's just really taking off and so many more opportunities are coming my way. And I've got really exciting potential collaboration coming up as well with lots of different bits to it. But I really want to get into a certain property strategy going forward. Bye. wanting to do it for a while now. And this person that I'm potentially going to be collaborating with is very prominent in this particular strategy. And she said to me, she's like, rather than you just pay me to teach you how to do it, let's do a collaboration with Girls and Property and let's do something together where you could be the guinea pig and basically prove that it works and prove that you can do it. So yes, there's a service exchange kind of collaboration. potential coming up. So I think I'm just going to celebrate that. And again, it's, all about getting your personal brand out there, getting out who you are, um and then building on that. It's not, it's not an overnight thing. It does take time. It takes effort and consistency, but when you get there, it's great. And all of these can conform. So it's not been confirmed yet. So it may or may not happen, but there is a conversation taking place and it's very, very exciting. So when it comes off, try about it. Yeah. Always celebrate. Always, always celebrate. uh So Sarah, going back then to this notion, so you mentioned originally about different types of debt that you can get into, credit cards for example, loans, and you were saying some should be paid off quicker than others, some should be left, so why don't we talk about the different types of debt and loans we can get into and how you can really get yourself out of those. So, I mean, most people all know the different types of debt. your credit cards loans, overdrafts, buying a car on finance, buying a house on mortgage. Generally, if you're using other people's money to buy the things that you want, then you're getting yourself into debt. There is a difference between good and bad debt though, right? So some debt is considered good debt, if actually you're utilizing it to make more money. So for example, a buy to let mortgage, Obviously it goes, and probably you guys will know this, a mortgage where you've borrowed the money to buy the asset for the asset to then pay you an income, that would be considered good debt, right? It's making you some money. Where bad debt sits, credit cards to, I don't know, to go to Ibiza for the weekend with your friends and you whack it all on a credit card and then it takes you five years to clear those flights, that's bad debt, right? That's just costing you a fortune. What happens is we put it on the credit card. We don't think actually I've got a 500 pound flight, but that 500 pound is actually with interest and time and everything compounded, it's going to take me three years to clear it. Actually, you've probably paid like double for the flight. So we don't look at that though. We don't very often consider, well, actually what I actually paid back was X pounds. So bad debt is debt that's draining your resources. Good debt is debt that's adding to your resources basically. Now in terms of the line between what you should pay off and what you shouldn't, the industry basically has got a standard. And again, I wish everybody just knew this because it's actually very simple. If something is costing you more than 7 % a year, then you want to clear that debt. It's costing you less than 7 % a year, then you can decide, or you've got the opportunity to choose, should I invest this money? and make more than 7 % back, or should I just clear the debt? But 7 % a year, and the thing is most people haven't actually looked at all their credit cards, at all their debt, and know what their rates are. I certainly didn't, because the worst thing in the world for me was to actually look at my credit card statements, because I just knew it was bad news, I just didn't look. And if I say to everybody here, if you are in debt and you know you're in debt and you know you wanna get out of it, but you've just got no idea how, The first thing I would suggest is that the emergency fund. But the second thing I would suggest is you open every single statement and you get a list of all of the debt, all the amounts and all of the interest rates. Once you know the interest rates, you can then say, okay, well, this one's 6%, this one's 4%, this one's 8%, this one's 12%, this one's 26%. Now I've got an American Express, it's like 700 % is the rate. Like you don't carry debt on a 700 % interest rate, it's mental. but some people do because they've not actually been ever been told what that means, right? So do the list, do all the debt. Don't judge yourself because of the list. Don't look at it and have judgment in it because you are where you are. We can't go back in time, right? But we can move forward. So write the list, write all the interest rates and then tackle the, you know, anything over 7 % start working on that. Anything under 7 % just leave it as it is and just let it tick along. Anything over 7%, you want to clear that first because that's costing you money that otherwise, you know. Interest rates on credit cards are horrendous. 26%, 25%. The only other things I think are probably worse than credit cards is payday loan type things. You wanna try and get rid of all of that, the expensive first. But there's two different ways to clear your debt, right? There's a snowball effect and there's an avalanche effect. Again, I talk about this in the book. You can either attack your... debt by tackling the highest interest rate first. When you do that, you save more money faster. Or if you're somebody who needs to feel momentum, because actually you're like a quick wins person, you tackle the smallest balance first. So like if you've got a 300 pounds, a 5,000 pounds and a 20,000 pounds, with the 300 pounds target that first, you feel like you've won because you've done, you've ticked off one and then you can tackle the next. That is one option. Well, the other option is that you go with the highest interest rate first. So forget the balances, but the highest interest rate, let's say you've got a credit card that's 40%, they do exist, believe it or not, but they do. So you tackle that one, you get rid of that one first, then you go to your 26%, get rid of that one, then the 18, then the 10, then the eight, then the seven point is where you can choose, do I invest now or do I clear debt? If you've got debt costing you more than 7 % a year, that's the line, that's the debt you want to clear first. Yeah, you see and they just don't teach you these things do they? Like who is going to teach you and talk to you about these things if nobody is talking about money? It's just a cycle that just goes round and round. And credit cards is a really interesting one actually Sarah because I know some people who have lots of different credit cards for various reasons. For example, I have lots of different credit cards but for me I was actually raised by my mum to always pay off my credit cards. My mum always said to me, don't spend on a credit card unless you can afford to pay it at the end of the month. Otherwise you're going to get stung. So for example, I've got an Amex because I like getting my points for BA, getting all the benefits, but she's like, you better be able to pay that at the end of the month. And I always set it up that way. Cause always, as you said, it's ridiculous, the APR on that. But I also have some friends, for example, who refuse to use a credit card their entire life, all the way up until the age of 30, whatever they are. they have always just used their debit card and the money that they actually have in the account. Do you kind of have an opinion about credit cards be debit cards at all? Yeah, I do. I've got a whole chapter in the book about this, right? So I was also taught that use money that you've got, right? Use your debit card. But the trick to this or the hack to this is I will go and spend on my credit card and the same day just move the money from my debit card to my credit card, right? So I'm still using my debit money every day or if I use my credit card every other day or whatever. And at the end of the month, I make sure that nothing's being carried over. Now it could be that you just clear the balance on the last day of the month, however you choose to do it. But if you're somebody who's a, I only ever want to use my debit card person, and it gives you anxiety to have a credit card balance, then just do it every day. Just move the money every single day. as you use it, buy your petrol on your credit card, pay it off with your debit card when you sat in a car park, like just straight away. You'll never get in trouble that way. But what you will get is points. and discounts and all these things. If you want to make your money work hard for you, if you want to make your money go further, then a credit card's going to be, certain credit cards are going to be the way to do that. You mentioned points like Amex. I've got, I think I've got something like half a million Amex points. Like I'm going to Malta for my friend's wedding in June. The flights were booked on points. The hotel has been booked on point. And I mean, I've had to pay some money, but it's not a lot. I stayed in Hilton last week for three nights and it was like 50 quid, including breakfast, which at the Hilton Wembley, it's like a 400, like it should have been about four or 500 pounds. All because I pay for my petrol on my credit card instead of my debit card. Like money that I'll be using anyway, my food shopping, my magazine subscriptions, I don't know, like stuff that you buy anyway, use your credit card where you can get the points. and then just pay it off straight away so that you're making your money go further. I always find it quite interesting when I talk to people about flying first class and flying business because people that sit at the back of the plane generally think that the people at the front of the plane are rich. And it's not the case. It's just the people at the front of the plane have probably paid less for their ticket than you did at the back of the plane because they leveraged points. Most of the time, most people I've ever met in business, most people I've ever met in first. are there on an annex. They're there on points. So I flew to LA, first class, returned for 300 quid. And actually those flights at the back of the plane were 700 pound tickets. So I am certain that people who are refusing to use credit cards and only working on debit are missing out. You don't want to carry balances. I totally agree. You don't want to pay for things on a credit card that you can't afford. but you absolutely can use your credit card in a really clever way so that you make your pounds go that little bit further. Your pound is worth more money. Yeah, great advice. And also it helps with your credit scores, doesn't it? Credit ratings. So is that right? Yeah, I mean, obviously, if you're, there's a ratio that they look at, look at what they've, you know, if you apply for a mortgage or debt, they look at how much debt to your debt maximum ratio that you're carrying. if you know, let's say you've got allowable 25 grand of debt, and you've got 24,500, they would consider that you're carrying too much debt because you're maxed out. Whereas if you've got 25 grand limit across all your credit cards and loans and overdrafts and everything, but you've only got a thousand pound on it, then you're not carrying too much debt. So that impacts in a positive way. Okay, there you go. See, it's always good to have these conversations and learn exactly. So what would you say like when people come and talk to you about understanding money and you know, whether they're in debt or they're wanting to invest or they want to use that money? Well, like what would be the number one bit of advice that you think everybody needs to have to move forward into the next phase? Because what I mean by this and my question to you I'm asking you is because of this like that there are people who are my age who I'd even use myself as an example here, because I think if I do that, it might help others relate. Like, I'm in my 30s, nearly mid-30s. The reason that we're not moving to the next stage of our life at the moment is because we keep saying, oh, one day we'll be able to do that because we'll be able to afford it. One day we'll do that to be able to afford it. So what I'm talking about is marriage. I'm talking about kids. I'm talking about the next stage. but you don't do it because of how expensive everything is. Like we were talking earlier before the podcast about the cost of living. We were talking about this notion about people saying often, I want to do it, but I can't at the moment because I can't afford it. Like, what would you say about that? So I remember that, like when we got married in 2015, we were having the same, you know, I was 32 then, so I'm 10 years older than you. And we had conversations that went basically around in circles the week after our wedding. Bear in mind, we also went to Colchester for our honeymoon because we had no money to go to anywhere else, right? So we're sitting in a hot tub in a farm in Colchester and we were saying, you know, Shall we go traveling? Shall we buy a house? Shall we get a dog? Should we have a baby? Like, what should we do? And everything came back to, we've got no money. We can't, we'd love to, but we've got no money. We'd love to, but we've got no money. And honestly, I made a decision. Like, I literally remember the decision being, this is not gonna be my life. This cannot be my life. Like, I need to be able to live a life. What I'd to someone in early thirties is you're still like in your early thirties. So whilst you feel like you're getting old, you're really not. And, you know, I look at the last 10 years from when I was your age to now, and I never in a million years could have anticipated what's happened in such a short space of time. And I kind of wish I'd been a bit kinder to myself at the beginning because actually, well, you know. before I started the business and before I did anything, I genuinely put on a really great show to everybody else, but inside it was just turmoil. I was really unhappy. I was really stressed about money. I worried about it. It was horrible. And it did stop me moving my life forward. I kind of went belt and braces, just, I'm just gonna clear my debt and do nothing else. However, when I started to make some money, I... did really start to enjoy it as well. And I started to accept that I'd done well. And I think I wish, I kind of wish that I'd celebrated along the way a little bit in the earlier days. Because I think that would have helped me to enjoy the journey a little bit more, rather than being just, I was very rich compared to what I was. Not as wealthy as I am now, but within a two year window, I went from like 60 grand of debt to having houses that I owned and cash in the bank and all these things. But along the way, I hadn't really celebrated that at all. So I think set the goals. And again, I talk about this in the book, automating your money is gonna be something that will be really powerful. If you know you wanna get married and you know you wanna have children, you know you wanna go traveling, you know you wanna do these things, can get a run. mean, children are like an unlimited cost, I think. I don't think we can ever plan what they're gonna cost. But like a wedding, if you know that you wanna get married and you wanna put 10 grand away for the day or 20 grand away for the day. then just set up a standing order from your own account that just starts to put 10 pound a month away or 20 pound a month or whatever your figure is that you can afford. If you want to clear your debt, if you want to build an investment pot, if you want to save for a Ferrari, like I don't care what it is, if you could automate your money, it's going to help because it takes the thinking out of it. It means that on payday, you get paid, all the money goes to where you need it to be. That's saving for that thing, that's saving for that thing. And then you have the rest that you live on. So I think you have to just... Be a bit intentional, I guess, is probably the answer to the specific answer, is make a decision that this is what we're gonna do, this is how we're gonna do it, and we're gonna automate that as much as we can and then stick to it. Yeah, I love that. That's such a great bit of advice as well. We've often spoken about actually automating it. We've got some some friends who call it the like the fun money and that they put as a couple they put like a fun fun money away. So we were talking about doing that with them with business owners, Sarah. So a lot of the listeners who listen to this are business owners. And one of the hardest things to do when you're starting a business is knowing when to invest and when not to invest, for example, because cash flow is obviously king when you're starting out and hiring or investing in mentors or just trying to take yourself forward. Have you ever had sort of people come to you about that before and going look I've just started my business all of these outgoings are going on for the business but I'm not really seeing the return just yet particularly in property let's face it. I mean what advice would you would you give to that as well? there's lots of things I could say but what I would say is have faith and work hard and it sounds a bit kind of cliche I guess but in business, different to personal finances, there's two different avenues but with business... So many people that I meet today want all the spoils of being really successful in business, but they're not willing to do the things that it takes to be very successful in business, right? And I mean this with all the love I can possibly throw with it, but if what you want is a life where I worked really hard to be able to live a life where I don't wake up to an alarm clock, like that was something I don't want to wake up to an alarm clock. I don't want to have noise in my head every morning waking me up. I just want to wake up when my body wakes up. And I live that life now, right? But to get to that point, I had to get early alarms. To get to that point, I had to go to bed late. To get to those things, I had to sacrifice other stuff. But now I have it, I will keep that forever. Like that is something in my life that's like a non-negotiable. Unless I'm going to the airport to fly somewhere, or I've got like a wedding to be at, like something like that, I don't set an alarm, ever. Do know what's so funny? You know, with all the businesses that you've got, all the money that you've made, it's the simple pleasures that actually are what you want. I don't want an alarm clock waking me up every day. I think as well, you know, when I speak to them, they're like, well, I've worked four hours this week and I've not made any money. I'm like, well, if I only worked four hours, I also wouldn't make any money. There's nothing different between me and you. It's just that I've probably been told no more. I've got it wrong more. I've lost, probably lost more money than most people along the way. And what that's done is teach me a million reasons, a million ways not to do stuff so that I can do it right. Do you know what I find personally, with people that I speak to, and I totally understand why, because I think if I'm honest with myself, maybe I was similar at the beginning as well, is I know people who work all the hours, they work really hard, they put their heart and soul into it, they put loads of money into it, but they think that they should have seen results quicker than they have. And I think that what happens is, is when you go and you speak to... educators or on social media, you see everybody who's been really successful and you think to yourself, hold on, I've worked an 18 hour day, I've invested all this money, why haven't I been successful? Why haven't I now got all the dreams two months later? And it's because people make you believe that you can get rich quick in 90 days and it's just not true. And the amount of people I speak to and they're like, Athena, I've done all of this, I've invested all this money, but I'm still not there. And I'm like, that's because you're only two months in. So this, yeah, 100%. Like if I use the gym analogy, a lot of people understand the gym analogy, right? First of all, what a lot of people do is they join a gym. and now they're a gym member, they think that's gonna be the solution, but it isn't, you've gotta go to the gym. Not only have you gotta go to the gym, you've gotta get on the treadmill. Not only have you gotta get on the treadmill, you've gotta make sure that every time you get on the treadmill, it's just that little bit harder, just that little bit harder, just that little bit harder, and you always feel like you're fighting, the incline goes up, the pace goes up, the incline goes up, the pace goes up, it's harder, harder, harder, harder, harder. If you then six months later look back and went and go on the treadmill, the same settings it was the day you got on it, it'll feel easy. But because every time you're going in business, every time you're something new, it's new. It's the incline going up and the pace going up. It's always going to feel hard. Always. Except that if you want to be in business, it's never going to feel finished ever. The other thing is that what a lot of people I find do is that they do work hard. They put in the hours. but they put in the hours doing things that are not actually gonna move the needle anywhere close to what they want. They put in the hours worrying about building a website in the early days, getting a logo, having a business card printed, instead of putting in the hours going and walking into networking rooms and meeting people and having conversations, because getting a business card printed is safe. going and putting yourself in a networking event or coming on a retreat like you girls run or my retreat or anything like that and go and put yourself in a room for people you don't know and having conversations is hard and scary and uncomfortable and people don't wanna do it. It costs money. So they spend time worrying about a business card or they spend time scrolling on Rightmove or they spend time doing things that are never gonna make them any money instead of actually picking up the phone to the agent and putting an offering. Picking up the phone and booking a viewing. going and meeting the person, the thing, whatever. You can put in an 18 hour day, but if it's 18 hours of bollocks, it's still not gonna make any difference. You'd be better off putting in two hours of real solid needle moving activity that's gonna make you money. You'd feel less overwhelmed. You'd be making more money. You'd feel like you're making more progress and you could sleep more. So just choose your activities better is what I would say. Most people are not doing the right things. could not have said that better myself sorry. yes yes yes yes. i feel like i'm like you know like sometimes you see those memes of girls like clicking behind you. i feel like i'm just clicking behind you. i'm like yes girl you say it. that's exactly it. that's exactly it. and i was so guilty of this when i started because i obviously came from a full-time job. i believe that oh the more hours i put in that you know it means i'm going to be more successful. no it's complete rubbish because what you do is you don't know what you're doing. So you might work an eight hour day, burn yourself out and think, I'm so great. I've worked eight hours and burnt myself out, but you haven't actually done any business development. You haven't actually gone forward or done anything. So yes, we'll do a whole other episode about that. Cause that's such an important point. Yeah. have this myself and I don't want anyone to listen to this and think, oh, know, Sarah, you've got it nailed 100 % of time. I haven't. I'm in a real transition period of our business where we've had Cogito Wealth, which is our property education company for seven years. And we are now really pushing towards money mechanics workshops. You we're trying to move the money mechanics workshops, not just into the online education, like personal finance space, but to approach corporate companies to help them run employee workshops around financial education. And I've noticed myself doing it in the last six months. I know what I should be doing is sending out emails to HR directors to say, this is what we do. This is how I can help. This is why you should come and meet me. And instead what I've been doing is like faffing around with like copywriting of an email or, you know, thinking, I'll just check my emails. Why? If I sent out a hundred of those messages a month for a year, somebody would book us to come in and do those workshops. And that gives us the starting point, the momentum, et cetera. The problem is we don't want to do those things because those things are hard, scary, and people might say no to us. So we get frightened. But I know myself well enough to know if I don't do those things, we won't make any money. So I do them. What a lot of beginners do is they think, I'm not going to do that because maybe I'm not ready. Maybe if an HR director asks me for a link to something and it's not there, I'm going to be, I'll look stupid. You won't, you'll just make the information and you'll send it. Like you've just got to do the hard stuff, the stuff that terrifies you. That's the work you should be doing. And it's in that work that the solution is not in the other stuff, because the other stuff's just stuff. m looking for a new sponsor for girls and property at the moment and I should be getting on with that. I should be sending out my emails. I should be letting the world know I'm looking for a new sponsor and instead I'm doing exactly what you did. I am editing the copy for the email. I'm responding to the girls of the community. Yeah, yeah, let me just make this look pretty in Canva. So I'm doing it as well. What I should be doing is getting my list together of all the sponsors and pinging out to 100 people. That's what I should be doing. So... Do you know what, takeaways, Sarah, is I'm gonna be sending out my email and I'm gonna be setting up a little automated fund, like an emergency fund as well, so I'm gonna be doing that. Got two action steps today. oh Sarah, I've loved this. If you were to say your last bit of information to the girls and guys listening, who you're like, if only I had known that or one bit of golden nugget you would just love to give to everybody, what would that be? So I think where money is concerned, if we just focus in on that, because there's a lot of things I could say, we have to believe that where we are today is actually not our fault. Unless you know that you intentionally went and blew 20 grand on a handbag you couldn't afford, right? In which case is your fault, you made a terrible choice. Most people aren't in debt because of that. Most people are in debt because they very slowly spent more than they've had. And then things have come up and they've not had it. So it's gone under and they've very slowly, very slowly built up to a point where it's now overwhelming or out of control. You've been playing in a rig game. It's not your fault. And if you can remove the emotion on it or stop judging yourself because of it and actually approach it with strategy and intention, it is fixable. It might take you a while. It might, you know, it me two years, 23 months. Some people it take 10 years, but It is fixable. So you have to remove that judgment, that shame, the embarrassment. Like it's not actually your fault. You've been playing in a big game, learn the process. Financial resilience is there for everybody, provided you know the route to get to it. And that's the thing we're not taught. So you've got to take responsibility for learning that. Yeah, definitely. And also I suppose just get the advice from the right people. know, people who have, like yourself, who have been in debt, have managed to get out of it and now investing and using money in the right way and really understanding about bad debt, the good debt. So Sarah, so many people I know are going to want to talk to you after this because it's such an important conversation to have. It really is. And actually I'd love to have this conversation inside the community as well, because I just think it's before you can start investing, you have to first... look at where you are and take stock of where you are first. I think that's so important to do. So how can people find you usually on socials or best place? I would say Instagram is probably the best place to come find me. My Facebook account has actually been suspended at the weekend. I've no idea why, but I don't think I'll be getting it back. So I would normally say find me on Facebook, but I'm not going to be there anymore. em Yeah, I'm not really sure what to do about it. We're figuring it out. So what I'd say is Instagram, I am Sarah Pointon on Instagram. That's my handle, but you can always email us as well. So our email address is learn. kajito-wealth.co.uk. I'll give you the email to put in the notes. em And the book is on Amazon. So it's called Money Mechanics. It's got the audible version on there or the printed version, whichever you prefer and want to listen to. And if you Google me, you'll find me, but I'd love to hear from anybody who's listened in and thought, you know, it's been helpful. Or if you'd want any more thoughts from me, I'd love to hear from. And if anyone's got a company and wants a financial workshop, then talk to me because that's my mission for today is to be sending out messages like yours, Action Points, em is to be talking to people more about the kids' workshops that we do and the company workshops that we do. So yeah, I'd love to hear from anybody. huge and I love the fact you're doing that with the kids like good on you that I think that's where the real reward comes isn't it is with the kids fulfilling actually, like, and again, the long term vision for that is to have sponsors so we could deliver those for free. And we're not quite there yet, but over time that's where we'd really like to take it. So yeah, it's so cool. I feel quite proud of it. Yeah, you should. You should feel so proud of it. I love that. And as always, girls and guys, if you want to find me, I am Athena Dobson underscore official. And then you can find me also on Instagram under girls and property. We've also got the girls and property community, which I've just been referring to. So as of recording this, we're now just over about 103 inside the community, which is amazing. We launched it back in May last year and I've now taken it to 103 members, which is absolutely crazy. So. If you're ever looking for, you're a female in the property world, uh finance, construction, you're looking for a place to go and feel safe and seen. It's all built on the Circle platform. And then we do, uh we do sort of sessions within it. So on the first Tuesday of every month, I get a property person to come on. And then usually the third, get something to do with business. So it might be money mechanics. It might be personal branding. It might be AI. It might be breath work, whatever it may be, because we've got to think about who we are as people. to be the best business owners that we can then be. So if you want any information about that, then just DM me the word community. And also pop it in your diary, Saturday the 5th of July for the community members, I'm doing a free summer soiree social on Bournemouth beach. So if you want any more information, DM me the word beach and come down to Bournemouth and hopefully it'll be a sunny day. um Yeah, yeah, come. Honestly, it'll be so much fun. can't wait. We've got like a little beach hut. We're gonna be in the sea. We're gonna like, everyone gonna bring a dish. It's gonna be great. See soon. uh But Sarah, I would love for you to have like the last word for the podcast and kind of, you know, your voice and saying it. um So actually, before you do that, you did actually say, because I think it's important just to mention this just before we finish the podcast, you mentioned before we came on that you'd actually had an incident where something hadn't quite gone right or with the money stuff. Yeah. Do you want to, I think that's a great way to finish this because... Yeah. we come across as having this conversation to say, come on, guys and girls, get your acting gear. Let's also bring it back to reality to show what can also happen. So, you know. Yeah, so I talk about this in the book. This is not a secret. Every time I present anywhere, I share this. So I'll share it with you guys. So when I first started investing in like stocks and shares in the markets and cryptocurrency and foreign exchange, moved away, not moved away from property. I'm still doing property now, but I started to add layers into my investment portfolio because what I wanted to do was diversify. But what I didn't really... I didn't really trust myself to choose investments because I felt like I was new. I felt like actually I was still learning. So I thought, I know what I'll do. I'll invest my money with a fund manager who manages your money and I'll let them trade my money on my behalf and they'll just pay me my returns and stuff. Now that does work and I don't want to put anyone off that. In some cases, that's an exceptional way to do things. One of my missions and one of the reasons that we... talk or the things we talk about in the book is I want you to learn to be the champion of your own money. Like that is where really you want to be. But in the early days, actually, putting money into a fund worked for me. What didn't work for me was that I didn't have any idea how to do due diligence on fund managers. So whilst I have put money into different funds, and they've worked really, really well, I put some money into a fund that I knew was quite high risk, and I was okay with that. But I put it into a fund and the commitment that they were offering me was like 30 % a month, which is a lot of money in a return wise. So I was like, do you know what? If I lost this money, it wouldn't be the end of the world, but I'm gonna give it a bash. So I put the money in for the first three months, it paid 30 % a month. And then I put more money in, because I was like, oh my God, I'm gonna make loads of money and it'd be great. Continued to pay, which was fine. And then I put a bit more money in. And then the guy that was running it, basically got drunk one night and just clicked the wrong button and blew everybody's money. The whole account went like hundreds of thousands of pounds. Well, not just my money, but everybody's money. And there was no recourse on that. There was no limitations to the amount was lost. And what I found out afterwards was that he basically just hadn't put any of the risk management stuff in place that you'd expect a fund manager to put in. There was no stop losses. There was nothing like that. And I knew it was a high risk. I knew that it was potentially money I could lose, but it did hurt a bit because I look back and I think I definitely didn't do the right due diligence and choose right. And I lost thousands and thousands of my god, did he just get away with that? Yeah, because there's no, there is no comeback to that. There's no protection in that sort of environment. There's no protection at all. Do know it is just... unregulated. It is Wild West. It really is. Now to say that though, there'll be people that have got money in funds right now. Don't panic about it. Like if your funds are doing well, you know, I've also got other funds that are doing very well, have consistently performed, you know, but these are right in the early days. Now I've learned there are a set of questions. There is reports that they can pull to show you their historic track record. You can ask them about their risk management strategies. You can ask them to show you that stuff and Anybody who says what's a risk management strategy, don't put your money with them. Right? Anyone who, you know, is willing to explain their risk management strategy and show you how they do it, not technically how they do it, but actually how it works in their fund, they're the places to put the money. And I think it's just about, know, I hear a lot of, especially in the property space, people lending money to people to, you know, private investment. And I fully support private investment as a strategy. I've raised money, I've lent money, I don't want to kind of rain on that as a strategy for funding, it's great. But it's only great if the money that you're lending, the money that you're putting in, you've done the due diligence on the person, the fund manager, the investor, the developer, whoever, if you haven't done any due diligence on them and they're signing a PG to protect your money, but they've signed PG's with a hundred other people, your money's no more protected than if you had a chewing gum wrapper. You have to do good due diligence. You have to have the right things in place. And I learned an expensive lesson, but I learned the lesson. most people, and most investors will lose money at some point, right? We know that, we accept that, but you want to lose as little as possible and due diligence, asking good questions will help you to do that. Yeah, fab and brilliant way to finish this podcast as well. Absolutely. Always do your due diligence. Don't be fearful. Don't let the fear hold you back. Feel the fear, do your due diligence and trust your gut. I think your gut speaks a thousand words and if there's one thing I've learned is I have ignored my gut so many times. um doesn't lie. Like it absolutely, and I don't know if men have the same, but when we listen to our instincts, it's never wrong. Never. have ignored my instincts multiple, multiple times and I've always then gone, I knew I was right. I knew I was right. So yeah, don't, don't ignore your instincts exactly. Sarah, thank you so much for coming on today's podcast. I can't wait to get you back on to be honest with you. I feel like, yeah, I feel like we've just scratched the surface. I feel like there's so much more that I'd love to dive into. So I will be getting you back on a hundred percent. And I hope you get everything sorted with your Facebook. um And also I'm reading more so I would get myself a copy of the book as well because I think it's something that I would definitely need to get a grasp on. So thank you for today and everyone listening, thank you so much for listening wherever you're tuning in from. Thank you for always supporting Girls and Property. Have the most amazing week and we will speak to you soon. Take care, bye.